Pakistan seeks $6bn for corporate farming from Saudi Arabia, other Gulf nations by 2028

[blain2]

so the army wants to take money from KSA, buy land that does not belong to them and have 50-50 stake with KSA and Army?
wouldnt it be better if we could simply open up our agri sector so the output can be exported?

in all this, please dont forget the existing food inflation in Pakistan. if we lose 100,000 acres of cultivable land to the Saudis, there is equivalent reduction in cultivable land for domestic comsumption.

Again, this is no different from having export oriented agriculture - which we could do even now, without having to sell stake in this to anyone and losing access to our own land.

Who said it's 50-50 stake for the Army and they will take the money from it? You do know that it was the armaments developed by POF under the MOD/Armed Forces head that gave Pakistan the breathing room needed to get the IMF program in place, right? So here too, the plan is to have something that helps the entire agriculture segment. This money is not going into MOD's budget.

Second, this is non-arable land that cannot cultivate anything so your assumption about 100K acres now no longer being available for domestic consumption is wrong in the first place. This acrage needs to be turned into an arable land tract first. It is producing zilch for domestic production currently. To get it to produce something, it requires investment thus this arrangement. And, sorry to disagree with you, if we could have done this ourselves, we would have done it 2 decades ago. Keep in mind that if GoP can launch programs like free laptop, free taxis, free bovine stock/chickens as was done in various past governments, then it can certainly think big with international partners as well. Set your politics aside and hope this works out. It will bring a sea-change in our agriculture and make Pakistan very competitive.

The bottom line is that this situation is no different than having all the "maadaniat ke zakhair" (minerals) in the country, but if you cannot fund the work to mine it, its all for nought. The same goes for millions of acres of land in Pakistan.

another propaganda post , where are those 25 billion dollars which dirty hafiz announced sudias are willing to donate us ?

No different than the 100s of billions promised by the PTI government that we were supposed to get from expat Pakistanis. Nothing materialized. A case of "best laid plans of mice and men, often go awry." I give PTI credit for trying, the new set up is doing the same.

 

[RoadRunner401]

Every single endeavor has risks associated. You either sit and do nothing or take a swag at it. Pakistan has needed land reforms since partition. This in some ways helps partially by bringing in a significant track of arid land under a single point of control. Pakistan's agricultural productivity has suffered because we cannot push agricultural reforms given the thousands of land owners wanting to do things differently or unable to do things due to lack of capital. Advanced seeding techniques, machinery etc. are all capital intensive endeavors that pay off if implemented at scale but since our kisaan is unable to, we produce even less than Holland (which has a population of 17 million people compared to our 240 million with 60% living in rural areas).

I am of the opinion that some oversight from the establishment gives the Gulf countries confidence that things will move faster than handing this over to Pakistani private sector. If I am to invest $5-6B, I would like to see some specific guarantees and the only ones that can provide this assurance in the prevailing situation is the establishment.

What you are looking for is the investors who bought Brooklyn Bridge

People who invest millions/billions have investment bankers who get paid handsome money in exchange they make sure their clients are happy.

You think the world investors are stupid ? Pakistani Generals who themselves park and invest their ill conceived billions outside of Pakistan are asking others to invest in Pakistan what a joke.

Dismantling the constitution and disobeying the courts destroying law and order for personal sake by the military is going to sit well with (investors) Arabs, blacks or whites, well if you do than good luck to you.

 

[Dalit]

Take such news with a big pinch of salt. This is the same KSA that was supposed to build billions worth of refineries at Gwadar not so long ago. I can assure you that no country in the world is going to invest billions in Pakistan.

Also remember that when retired generals don't provide details, but rather seek support from Arab countries it more often than not doesn't materialise.

What I can promise you guys is that KSA and the likes are investing billions in India.

 

[RoadRunner401]

Who said it's 50-50 stake for the Army and they will take the money from it? You do know that it was the armaments developed by POF under the MOD/Armed Forces head that gave Pakistan the breathing room needed to get the IMF program in place, right? So here too, the plan is to have something that helps the entire agriculture segment. This money is not going into MOD's budget.

Second, this is non-arable land that cannot cultivate anything so your assumption about 100K acres now no longer being available for domestic consumption is wrong in the first place. This land needs to be turned into an arable real estate first. It is producing zilch for domestic production currently. To get it to produce something, it requires investment thus this arrangement. And, sorry to disagree with you, if we could have done this ourselves, we would have done it 2 decades ago. Keep in mind that if GoP can launch programs like free laptop, free taxis, free bovine stock/chickens as was done in various past governments, then it can certainly think big with international partners as well. Set your politics aside and hope this works out. It will being a sea-change in our agriculture and make Pakistan very competitive.

The bottom line is that this situation is no different than having all the "maadaniat ke zakhair" (minerals) in the country, but if you cannot fund the work to mine it, its all for nought. The same goes for millions of acres of land in Pakistan.


No different than the 100s of billions promised by the PTI government that we were supposed to get from expat Pakistanis. Nothing materialized. A case of "best laid plans of mice and men, often go awry." I give PTI credit for trying, the new set up is doing the same.

New set up? Uncle you sound like a man living in La La Land, this so called "New" set up is being going on for last 75 years and have failed miserably.
PTI was given the government with their hands tied behind their backs. Who here isn't aware of that? I mean the Law Ministry is held by a Military (MQM) beaurocrat who sat on files and didn't follow the orders. Even after all that, Imran Khan managed to turn the economy around and dealt with pandemic successfully.

 

[blain2]

What you are looking for is the investors who bought Brooklyn Bridge

People who invest millions/billions have investment bankers who get paid handsome money in exchange they make sure their clients are happy.

You think the world investors are stupid ? Pakistani Generals who themselves park and invest their ill conceived billions outside of Pakistan are asking others to invest in Pakistan what a joke.

Dismantling the constitution and disobeying the courts destroying law and order for personal sake by the military is going to sit well with (investors) Arabs, blacks or whites, well if you do than good luck to you.

None of this stuff has ever mattered to external partners of Pakistan. Do you think the Americans, Chinese or the Arabs care about the rule of law or the constitution of Pakistan? None of them do. More specific examples follow.

Case #1: Saudi funding played a role in our nuclear weapons program development despite the fact that we had a military dictatorship in place then. They also did not care about some of the money being parked overseas by the Pakistani elite then. Then Arabs, Americans, Chinese partnered with us during the Soviet-Afghan war and then again post 9/11, "investing" money in Pakistan knowing that there would be some funds flowing outside.

Case #2: American, Saudi and Gulf support to Egypt. Hosni Mubarak and family siphoned billions off all the largess Egypt got. What mattered to the ones giving the money was that Egypt was converged on their agenda. This continues till date.

Case #3: CPEC. You know the details.

So our investor friends have no real interest in who is running Pakistan. What they care about is if the interests are converging, then their investments and returns should have safeguards. The establishment in Pakistan has been providing these safeguards for decades now and this continues today.

Coming back to this issue, all that matters is there is a convergence of interests. Food security is a major concern for Gulf. If Pakistan can align with them, then all of the above is possible and the constitution and the domestic politics don't even figure in these dealings.

New set up? Uncle you sound like a man living in La La Land, this so called "New" set up is being going on for last 75 years and have failed miserably.
PTI was given the government with their hands tied behind their backs. Who here isn't aware of that? I mean the Law Ministry is held by a Military (MQM) beaurocrat who sat on files and didn't follow the orders. Even after all that, Imran Khan managed to turn the economy around and dealt with pandemic successfully.

Good on IK but none of that matters now as it is all in the past. Life goes on, trade, deals etc. will carry on. Please see my response to RR above. It is wishful thinking that the world is waiting on Pakistan's democracy to get back on track with IK in charge again. Domestically it matters to our people, internationally not so much. Saudis have no favorites in Pakistan or maybe some less so than others (specially when IK curses out MBS and then one of his own cabinet members conveys that to the Saudis), so these deals will move ahead with whoever is in-charge.

Taking the politics out of it, this is good for Pakistan.

 

[blain2]

Take such news with a big pinch of salt. This is the same KSA that was supposed to build billions worth of refineries at Gwadar not so long ago. I can assure you that no country in the world is going to invest billions in Pakistan.

Also remember that when retired generals don't provide details, but rather seek support from Arab countries it more often than not doesn't materialise.

What I can promise you guys is that KSA and the likes are investing billions in India.

Everything has to be taken with a pinch of salt till it materializes. Healthy skepticism in Pakistan is the norm as it should be.

Point here is that there is an attempt being made to get foreign partnerships. For any Pakistani, this is a net positive.

If it does not happen, ok then back to the drawing board. Hope you remember the geo-economic pivot of the NS Policy worked on by Moeed Yusuf. These are the very types of initiative on which that pivot was based. Riders have changed, horses are still the same.

 

[Muji.Iqbal]

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan is seeking up to $6 billion investment from Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Qatar and Bahrain over the next three to five years for corporate farming, with the aim of cultivating 1.5 million acres of previously unfarmed land and mechanizing existing 50 million acres of agricultural lands across the country, the CEO of the company spearheading the initiative has said.

The development comes months after Pakistan set up a Special Investment Facilitation Council (SIFC) — a civil-military hybrid forum — to attract foreign funding in agriculture, mining, information technology, defense production and energy as the South Asian country deals with a balance of payments crisis and requires billions of dollars in foreign exchange to finance its trade deficit and repay its international debts in the current financial year.

Earlier this month, caretaker Prime Minister Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar said Saudi Arabia and the UAE would invest up to $25 billion each in Pakistan over the next five years in the mining, agriculture and information technology sectors.

Initiatives in the agriculture sector under SIFC are being administered by FonGrow, which is part of the Fauji Foundation investment group run by former Pakistani military officers.

“We have estimated about $5-6 billion [investment from Gulf nations] for initial three to five years,” Major General (retired) Tahir Aslam, FonGrow’s managing-director and chief executive officer, told Arab News in an interview.

He declined to share details about the breakdown of the investment from each individual country.

The CEO said the company was engaging with several Saudi companies like Al-Dahara, Saleh and Al-Khorayef to attract investment in the corporate farming sector. He did on elaborate on progress made so far in the discussions.

Aslam said his company was also working on different investment models with the Saudi and UAE companies for corporate farming, including joint ventures.

“If they want to make direct investment, it is a corporate model. So, they will take an equal number of stakes in the company, and they get an equal number of positions in the governance [of the company]. So, it is going to be a joint company.”

About strategy and targets to mechanize farming, Aslam said FonGrow was working on a two-pronged approach to bring up to 1.5 million acres of new arable land under cultivation and modernize 50 plus million acres of land already being farmed.

This, he said, would require about “$25 million per each thousand acres and other for machinery, and setting up of infrastructure for value addition.”

FonGrow is aiming to set up corporate farms on over 100,000 acres in the next 5-7 years. The first such farm had already been established on over 5,000 acres of land in Khanewal, he said.

“Next year, we will be starting our second farm on over 10,000 acres and we hope to develop the capacity to be able to develop 20 to 25 thousand acres every year,” Aslam said. “Mainly, we are starting in Punjab and then we are looking for lands. Wherever we get suitable lands, we will go to all the provinces.”

To a question about the source of capital to develop the land, the official said: “We have no issue of rupee capital availability for our project because ultimately it will bring returns to Fauji Foundation.”

“There is a small challenge that we are facing basically, which is of foreign exchange because the irrigation systems and the tractors and harvesters that we have to import, they need foreign exchange.”

Aslam said Pakistan’s corporate farming model envisioned that sixty percent of the crops would contribute to the country’s food security, and the remaining 40 percent would be exported mainly to Gulf countries to earn foreign exchange.

He said Pakistan had received a first export order of Fauji cereal products from a Gulf nation, though he declined to name the country:

“It is a starting quantum [that] is about $25 million worth of products in one year. But I think as we break more grounds this will continue to increase in the coming years.”

Responding to concerns about the army’s involvement in economic projects in Pakistan, he said the military was only contributing where requested by the civilian government.

“They [foreign countries] wanted an organization which provides continuity or security of their investment, that was the reason the army joined in and then the army also said we have such a large [investment] potential available,” the FonGrow CEO said.

“In the past also, the army has very willingly contributed to projects of nation-building and national importance … Army is playing its part, but no soldiers are involved.”

Pakistan seeks $6bn for corporate farming from Saudi Arabia, other Gulf nations by 2028

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan is seeking up to $6 billion investment from Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Qatar and Bahrain over the next three to five years for corporate farming, with the aim of cultivating 1.5 million acres of previously unfarmed land and mechanizing existing 50 million...

www.arabnews.pk

Good to see Arab countries investing in Pakistan, but ultimately we have to save our country ourselves.

I am hoping for China and Taiwan to invest in Pakistan as well.

 

[Meengla]

You think the world investors are stupid ? Pakistani Generals who themselves park and invest their ill conceived billions outside of Pakistan are asking others to invest in Pakistan what a joke.

Dismantling the constitution and disobeying the courts destroying law and order for personal sake by the military is going to sit well with (investors) Arabs, blacks or whites, well if you do than good luck to you.

It is not just the Generals of Pakistan who 'park' money outside of Pakistan. It is a large part of Pakistan's political class that does the same!! I make no distinction between the Judges, the Generals, the beuracracy, and the political class especially when they originate from central and northern Punjab. Look at how they intermarry? Look at how they so casually join political parties? Look at how they co-opt each other. This forum's Messiah Imran Khan himself had his party is FULL of the opportunists and turncoats while Imran safely 'parked' his sons in the UK.

Some honesty wouldn't hurt the fanbois. They shut down everyone, every good thing unless done by the Khalifa of Riyasat e Medina Imran Khan.

Read what Blaine says above: This is a viable project and for the country. The whole country will benefit from it, including the political class which is quite present in Imran's own party.

But then... arguing with cultists is like playing the proverbial flute to buffalo...

 

[Jf Thunder]

Pakistan army trades tanks for tractors in food-security push

Sprawling military-run farms stoke backlash over armed forces' pervasive presence

asia.nikkei.com

worth reading

 

[Azadkashmir]

It's not that high given they are talking about bringing non-arable land under cultivation. This requires intense water, machinery and effort.

This is not a bad idea for the Gulf countries as they can help Pakistan with the infrastructure to ensure their own food security. This will also have a positive impact/trickle down effect on our own food processing and export industry.

trickle down effect what left over wrappers? the left over food will go to the rishwat dogs .

 

[One_Nation]

Another dollar grab, land selling scheme by Pakistan army. I hope arabs don't fall for this trap. This kind of investment can be done internally. Foreign countries have no business in where we choose to grow our plants.

 

[Puffin]

Does the army believe if you make an announcement asking for $6 Billion for corporate farming the money will materialise from the Gulf like magic ?

Have they tested the theory of corporate farming by the army with some pilot projects producing a profit ?

Is this the same logic like CPEC . Build and the profits start raining out of thin air ?

 

[Edevelop]

Does the army believe if you make an announcement asking for $6 Billion for corporate farming the money will materialise from the Gulf like magic ?

Have they tested the theory of corporate farming by the army with some pilot projects producing a profit ?

Is this the same logic like CPEC . Build and the profits start raining out of thin air ?

Work already started

 

[Puffin]

I have no doubt some work has started, after all the army wants its hands on all and every piece of land. The story not being covered is that there were subsistence farmers on this land and they have been evicted and lands confiscated.
TFT covered the story of these farmers who have been thrown off the land and their voices and protests silenced.

 

[maithil]

Saudis are interested in signing a food security arrangement with us. We could see some movement soon there. May be they can invest in Pakistan as Plan B.