sign of the times; we now rely on investment, well from anywhere. Mula rules the world.

Is Mesi: Were the leases purchased with Australian aid money?

Bloody good question. I wish I'd nave thought of that.

More than likely. The Indo's are playing us for fools & the Government refuses to see it, for the sake of "Diplomacy."

The article is alarmist nonsense. The author complains about depressed prices for land and then complains when someone wants to buy. There is no suggestion that the buyers will escape Australian taxes, or be excused Australian laws, and they cannot take the land away. If they think they can make money farming in the NT, for example, then let them. They will have to hire local staff to do it.

As far as it is known, Australian land is still by and large owned (or leased) by Australian farmers, but its not possible to be certain as there are no reliable figures. The newly elected coalition plans to establish a registry. There have been no reports of mass sales, however, just the occasional large sale, such as Cubbie station going to the Chinese.

Hi Curmudgeon,

Yes, you're on the button, I'm not so sure about the uncertainty of land tenure - the Land Boards, Pastoral Boards, Lands Titles Offices, etc., would have an exact knowledge of who is holding what on what terms, and what sorts of title or tenure are being held, lot by lot, lease by lease.

There seems to be a vast array of different sorts of land-holding, licences, 42-year leases, longer and short leases, interests, Crown leases, perpetual leases (which aren't really), special purpose leases, as well as freehold titles with all sorts of qualifications and hedges.

For example, from the earliest times until recently, Aboriginal people had the right to use all pastoral leases (and crown land) as they had done traditionally, to hunt, collect, fish, gather food, etc., camp on, carry out ceremonies on, collect water on, all of that land. i.e. land-use rights, which only make sense if people are actually using the land. Early authorities thought, quite rightly, that those rights could co-exist with pastoral interests. I emphasise 'quite rightly'.

Land-use rights: if you don't use it, you effectively lose it. Which is what's happened over the past twenty years with Indigenous Land-Use Agreements, thanks to dumb-@rse lawyers.

Joe
www.firstsources.info

In the 1990’s I was contracted to manage an NT station to clean it up ready for sale by Japanese who has bought it to establish alternative protein supply. I accepted the contract because I was researching islander malnutrition and world fish depletion. Japan’s catch was declining at an alarming rate.

The Japanese owners were having trouble managing the Australian outback including due to a lot of night shopping of materials like wire left in outer paddocks.

After handing the property over to new owners and on return to NSW I spoke with Hogan’s mate Strop, about what to do about the food shortage causing people to buy up Aus properties. Strop suggested I speak to Frank Devine then editor of the Australian and he said to me I was the first person to come forward with the link between the Aus beef industry and devastated world fish stocks.

I also spoke to the FIRB and they told me they possessed no criteria to understand the fish beef link situation.

I also spoke to the Farm Journal, they found in north Queensland over 90% of beef export abattoirs where foreign owned, plus 30% nationally. I think it’s more now.

I became aware of IPS, international profit shifting. .

It all amazed me because the Aus beef industry was developed with Aus taxpayer money to create product to generate local and export revenue to pay for Aus hospitals and schools etc. So losing beef export revenue surely leads to increased taxes from elsewhere. E.g. GST etc.

Indonesia now has a big problem, so many people, fish stocks now devastated, alternative agriculture not what Aus consultants mooted it to be. Indo has poor soil even to the point live cattle sent there do not stay fertile due to malnutrition.

I think a solution may be for Indonesia to help develop new grazing land in Aus while at the same time helping to develop, say a northern wet season water harvesting aqueduct system that could reach Qld headwaters of the Darling River, helping many Aus farmers downhill along the way, even to S.A.

By buying Australian land, Indonesia is just doing vertical integration to secure domestic beef supply, nothing political about it.

Japfa Group is a large Indonesian agricultural conglomeracy with USD 2 bio revenue and USD 160 mio net profit in FY 2012, with land and farm investments in India, China, Vietnam, and Philippines. CAPEX of USD 35 mio to buy Australian farms is little peanuts for them, whereby their total 2012 CAPEX is USD 100 mio. RNI (the state-owned agricultural company) recorded USD 600 mio revenue and USD 35 mio net profit in 2012. CAPEX of USD 30 mio to buy Aussie farms is small for them as well.

These companies can be considered as middle-tier companies in Indonesia, there are many more much larger companies which has some beef-related interests and may buy-up more Australian land.