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Land Grab

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Land Grab
The global farms race: Land Grabs, Agricultural Investment, and the Scramble for Food Security

By Michael Kugelman and Susan L. Levenstein

Less than a decade ago, there really wasn't much information in regards to what the book, “The global farms race: Land Grabs, Agricultural Investment, and the Scramble for Food Security” by Michael Kugelman and Susan L. Levenstein, has offered us: deep, multi-positional insight presented by a host of authors with valid sources on one of the most interesting phenomenons happening within our current economic system. From the surface it seems to be talking about how developed food-secure nations are buying up swaths of farmlands from the worlds most food-insecure countries, but after a deeper look into the book, this phenomenon and it's complexities is much greater than that.

There are twelves chapters in this book, each chapter written by a different author or authors, getting into different aspects and perspectives of this so called “Land Grabbing” issue.

The first chapter (introduction) is written by Michael Kugelman, followed by some history by Derek Byerlee, an overview by David Hallam, social and economic implications by Alexandra Spieldoch and Sophia Murphy, environmental impacts by Laura A. German, Wouter M. J. Achten, and Manuel R. Guariguata, investors' perspectives by Gary R. Blumenthal, improving outcomes by Ruth Meinzen-Dick and Helen Markelova, regional perspectives on Africa, Asia, Latin America, Central and Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union by Chido Makunike, Raul Q. Montemayor, Bastiaan P. Reydon and Vitor B. Fernandes, Carl Atkin respectively, and finishes off with “Recommendations and Conclusion” by Michael Kugelman. The term “Land Grab” used on the book cover and in its pages depicts a large powerful foreign entity that acquire large amounts of land that is usually used by local poor communities to produce food and/or provide other essential basic human needs. These

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