RURAL property specialists have dismissed the recently-updated Foreign Investment Review Board’s register of foreign ownership of Australian agricultural land as being misleading and too simplistic.
The agricultural land register was established in 2015 to provide greater transparency about the level of overseas investment in Australia’s farmland.
The most recently updated FIRB report, for the 2019-20 year, was released in December.
It is important to note the register records foreign person entities that own a 20pc or more share in Australian farmland. This means there may also be a significant portion of Australian ownership in those same parcels of land.
As an example, China’s Shanghai CRED owns 33pc of S. Kidman & Co, with Gina Rinehart’s Hancock beef controlling the remaining 67pc – yet Shanghai Cred is credited by FIRB with a land holding of…
