Publications
Reports
In October 2005, the Oakland Institute published its report, Food Aid or Food Sovereignty? Ending World Hunger in our Time. Since then the issue of food aid has taken center stage in foreign aid, global hunger, and development discourse, sparking interest and debate amongst policy makers, media, and civil society internationally.
While Brazil's leadership on biofuels - particularly sugarcane-based ethanol - has been held as a global model for sustainable biomass production, a new report from the Oakland Institute and Terra de Direitos, Food & Energy Sovereignty Now: Brazilian Grassroots Position on Agroenergy, describes the opposition that biofuels face from the Brazilian social movements and civil society, as formulated at the First National Agroenergy Conference, held in Curitiba, Brazil in October, 2007.
In the summer of 2005, the world rocked to Live Aid concerts and the Make Poverty History Movement celebrated developed countries’ fresh commitments towards the International Development Goals (IDG), development assistance, and debt cancellation at the G8 summit in Gleanagles. Some three thousands miles south of this euphoria, a nation witnessed thousands of its children die of hunger. This was summer 2005 in Niger, the poorest country in the world.
by Robert Weil*Download this report in PDF
Korean and American Workers, Farmers and Legislators Voice Opposition to US-Korea Free Trade Agreement
Pages
Policy Briefs
Addax Bioenergy Sierra Leone Limited is the company behind the most developed land deal in Sierra Leone to date. “Renewable energy” subsidiary of Addax & Oryx Group, a Swiss-based energy corporation,2 Addax has leased 20,000 hectares for 50 years in the Bombali district to grow sugarcane to produce ethanol for export to Europe and electricity from the by-products to be sold in Sierra Leone.
Emergent Asset Management (Emergent), a private limited liability company based in the UK and minority owned by Toronto Dominion Bank, claims to be managing the largest agricultural fund in Africa. Using private equity to invest in industrial agriculture in sub-Saharan Africa, Emergent is however, a prime example of the troublesome rise in speculative funds that are investing in African agricultural land.
The Malibya project established by the Libyan Africa Investment Portfolio secures 100,000 hectares of fertile land for Libya within the borders of Mali. The land, located in the Office du Niger, comes free of charge for 50 years. Libya intends to build the necessary agro-industrial infrastructure (e.g. canals and roads) in order to cultivate rice and cattle in the region.
EmVest Asset Management is a joint venture between Emergent Asset Management and Grainvest, a subsidiary of the RussellStone Group. Based out of Pretoria, South Africa, EmVest operates the African Land Fund (ALF) and lists social responsibility as a guiding tenet of its investment strategy, citing a desire to bring “economic uplift to communities through commercially viable, first world practices.”
Quifel International Holdings (QIH) is the Lisbon-based personal holding of businessman Eng. Miguel Pais do Amaral, a Portuguese aristocrat, businessman, and former majority owner of the Media Capital Group.
Pages
NEW FILM
Lower Omo: Local Tribes Under Threat details the human rights impacts of land investment and the villagization process in Lower Omo and Gambella, Ethiopia.
Land Investment Deals in Africa
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info@oaklandinstitute.org
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