According to a report from the Financial Times, Korea’s Daewoo has just completed a deal to lease an area about half the size of Belgium (about 1.3 million hectares) in Madagascar for food production. The most surprising part of this lease is that the initial cost to Daewoo is nothing. That’s right, zip, nada, zilch.
Why is a South Korean company leasing so much land on another continent?
According to a Daewoo spokesperson:
We want to plant corn there to ensure our food security. Food can be a weapon in this world,” said Hong Jong-wan, a manager at Daewoo. “We can either export the harvests to other countries or ship them back to Korea in case of a food crisis.
Commentators have rightly pointed out though, that this deal is not entirely in South Korea’s favour. For example, in a food crisis, while Daewoo may plan on shipping food harvests back to South Korea, there is also a chance that Madagascar’s government may simply nationalize the land and/or confiscate the food products if necessary.
Finally, while some observers have been quite critical of the terms of this deal, other officials have pointed out that Daewoo would be investing significantly in infrastructure such as roads, grain storage and irrigation.
Food security as a potential defensive and offensive weapon. Not the first time, nor the last time that it happens.
Image Credit: Wharman at Flickr under a Creative Commons license.
“Salt played a key role in the Civil War and on the the present. In December, 1864, Union forces made a forced march and fought a 36-hour battle to capture Saltville, Virginia, the site of an important salt processing plant thought essential to sustaining the South’s beleaguered armies. Civilian distress over the lack of salt in the wartime Confederacy undermined rebel homefront morale too.”
http://www.saltworks.us/salt_info/si_HistoryOfSalt.asp