Foreign Held Agricultural Land In The United States

foreign-held-agricultural-land-in-the-united-states

One way that foreigners are divesting their shrinking dollars is to buy agricultural land in the United States. While their overall holdings of all U.S. land is not vast by percentage (yet), the number of acres they own may be startling to you…


 
Foreign investors hold an interest in 25.7 million acres of U.S. agricultural land!

Foreign persons have reported acreage holdings in all 50 States.

The state of Texas has the largest amount of foreign held U.S. agricultural land with 2,894,563 acres.

Maine has the second largest amount of foreign held agricultural acres with 2,877,965.

Washington has the third largest amount of foreign held agricultural land with 1,671,102 acres, which is 7.6 percent of its privately held agricultural land!

16 percent of Maine’s privately held agricultural land is held by foreign investors; this is approximately 11 percent of the reported foreign held agricultural land in the United States.

Foreign landholdings in cropland and pasture land is increasing in the United States.

(Data sourced through DEC-2011 via a newly released USDA report)

 
It is an understatement that owning land which can produce is a good investment. It is an investment in life. Land that can produce food or even energy is something where you really can’t go wrong when it comes down to survival.

Even a small hobby farm will present a lifestyle of more self sufficiency and a better chance of survival should things go really bad…

Foreigners are buying our agricultural land… so what does that tell you?

…thought you would like to know.

9 Comments

  1. wow, doesn’t seem to bode well for a country’s stability…

    I suppose (?) that many of those are “retirement” or “snowbird”?

    Wonder how that compares to other countries? (Canada)

    also,
    I suspect a good per cent of those, in U.S. and Canada, land holdings may be folks who “bought in” so they have the future potential of securing citizenship?

    also, from folks from various countries with businesses there, so they can “get some of their money out” of whatever country they currently live in?

  2. Hope you like it when your food is shipped off to China. At least they will be able to pay in real gold backed currency or
    manufactured goods. They already own the largest pig farm in the U.S.. They really like pork in China. Soon you will see steep price rises and shortages. Let “THE HUNGER GAMES” begin!

  3. Another twist to this is that those foreign farms don’t show a profit and thus don’t pay taxes. I know of an example in California where the land is owned by a Japanese company and they grow citrus fruit for the Japanese market. But unlike their competitors who have to make a profit and pay taxes on that profit the citrus from this farm is sold at a loss to Japan. Once it is in Japan it is marked up of course and the company makes a nice profit.

    1. @happy;
      You may be surprised to learn that most of California’s citrus crop is shipped out of the country, not just Japan (although they do get the lion’s share), and at a loss. Only difference between the Japanese owner and the American owner: Japanese don’t pay taxes on their loss, Americans get reimbursed for their loss by our government (in other words, Us).
      This is happening with all crops, not just citrus. It has caused all the premium product to be sent elsewhere and we’re left with culls in our grocery stores.
      Are you old enough to remember buying bags of potatoes at the store and every potato was perfect? Now, you can’t find even one good potato out of a 10# bag, they all have black spots, cuts, scab and mold. The perfect ones are being sent out of the country.

      1. Tammy..
        well, I am sad to be feeling stupid, but, now that you say this, it makes perfect sense. We no longer (at the store) buy a bag of potatoes, regardless the price, as most of them will go in the garbage…etc..

        Yes, your comment makes perfect sense.
        “It has caused all the premium product to be sent elsewhere and we’re left with culls in our grocery stores.
        Are you old enough to remember buying bags of potatoes at the store and every potato was perfect? Now, you can’t find even one good potato out of a 10# bag, they all have black spots, cuts, scab and mold. The perfect ones are being sent out of the country.”

      2. A friend of mine that owns a liquor store is unable to buy any of the best champagnes at new years because the companies had sold it all to china. They recieved a higher price from the wealthy chinease. Probably a sighn of the times. Money talks and B.S walks

  4. happy, I have read, for years, both in U.S. and Canada, about the HUGE number of family farms bought up by foreigners, sometimes individuals,sometimes foreign companies.

    for some reason, never read before/never occurred to me, regarding your point. that is quite the manipulation, and easily done, on their part.

  5. I have read quite a bit about foreign owned (usually Chinese owned) farmland in the United States and Canada. It seems this foreign farm ownership is also in other countries. Thing I keep wondering, is, China is not a small country. If they wish to have farms..dairy / swine/ etc, they have plenty of room, and surely enough manpower to manage it….WHY is China buying up farms/farm type situations, across the world?

    (To control the food supply? If you control the food, you control the people?)

    http://www.seeddaily.com/reports/Chinese_buyer_for_Australias_largest_dairy_farm_business_999.html

    Chinese buyer for Australia’s largest dairy farm business
    by Staff Writers
    Sydney (AFP) Feb 23, 2016

  6. We are being conquered economically why fight us when you can buy us out, stop and really think about it nice and clean with no property damage like World War 2

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