Posts Tagged ‘Agriculture Minister’
DAMMAM – Government has adopted several measures to develop agriculture, fisheries and animal production, and will welcome investors, said Minister of Agriculture, Dr. Fahd Bin Abdul Rahman Balghunaim on Saturday.
He urged investors to work hand-in-hand with the ministry to help solve all the problems facing the sector. He said investors should form consortiums to save time and money and the ministry was open to support any initiative that would serve the agricultural sector.
JEDDAH – Indonesia expects a 6 percent rise in its milled rice harvest this year, leading to a 2 million tons surplus, and aims to attract Gulf Arab investors to develop “sleeping land”, Agriculture Minister Suswono said.
“Growth is 6 percent from last years figure and over the next five years we would like to see a growth of 3.2 percent,” he said on Saturday, during a visit to Saudi Arabia.
CHICAGO – Saudi Arabian investors are looking to expand their agricultural investments in the United States to secure long-term food supply because of water shortages in the desert kingdom, Saudi officials said on Thursday.
Investments could range from buying crop land, obtaining long-term land leases of 30 years or more, taking equity stakes in major food companies or contracting directly with farmers to grow crops, they said.
ALGIERS – Saudi Arabia will import up to 1.2 million tons of cereals this year and is cutting its own grain output because of concerns about the water supply, the Saudi Agriculture Minister said on Wednesday.
“We expect our (cereal) imports to reach between 1 million and 1.2 million tons this year,” Fahad Abdul-Rahman Balghunaim told Reuters at a meeting of Arab agriculture ministers in the Algerian capital.
JEDDAH – Saudi Arabia and Tunisia agreed to implement a program of cooperation in the farming sector.
A schedule and follow-up mechanisms were adopted during a working session held as part of the five-day visit of Abdessalem Mansour, Minister of Farming, Water Resources and Fishing which ended on Tuesday.
Mansour agreed with Saudi Agriculture Minister Fahd Belghim to take advantage of the two countries experiences in terms of water desalination and utilization of treated water for irrigation. The aim is to establish co-operation and twinning operations between both countries centers of research in the sectors of palm tree planting, date packaging, fishing and fish farming.
RIYADH: The Ministry of Agriculture and the King Saud University (KSU) in Riyadh have signed a SR187 million agreement to establish a Sustainable Agriculture Development and Research Center in Riyadh.
The agreement was signed by Agriculture Minister Fahad Balghunaim and Abdullah Al-Othman, rector of the King Saud University in Riyadh, on Wednesday.
“The priority of the Ministry of Agriculture is to achieve sustainable agricultural development with the conservation of natural resources, particularly water,” said Balghunaim, adding that he hopes that the project would help farmers as well as consumers get the best out of new technology.
RIYADH: Saudi farmers are abandoning wheat cultivation faster than the government had anticipated under a plan to save dwindling water resources, Agriculture Minister Fahd Balghunaim said in an interview on Tuesday.
Saudi Arabia became a major buyer of wheat on global markets after starting the phase-out program, to be run over eight years, in September 2008.
JEDDAH: Sugar price has risen twice in December and there are indications that it might continue to rise in coming months. The commodity, which was selling for SR3 per kg in the beginning of the month, rose to SR3.50 and has been selling for SR4 per kg since last week, a visit to local shops and supermarkets revealed.
Shopkeepers say the price of sugar will go up to SR5 per kg in the coming weeks. While the price for one kg pack is almost the same in baqalas, grocery shops and major supermarkets, the prices for 5 kg and 10 kg of sugar vary by SR1.50 to SR3 respectively. A 5-kg bag in supermarkets is selling between SR16.50 and SR17.50 whereas baqalas and grocery shops are charging between SR18 to SR20. A 10-kg bag in supermarkets is selling for SR30 whereas baqalas and grocery shops are charging SR33 and above.
LONDON: Britain and France urged world leaders Thursday to impose a tax on bankers bonuses, a day after London announced a one-off levy on the much-criticized finance sector benefits.
Seeking to show a united front days after a public Anglo-French spat over financial regulation, Prime Minister Gordon Brown and President Nicolas Sarkozy said there was an urgent need for a new agreement between banks and society.
We propose a long term global compact that will encapsulate both the responsibilities of the banking system and the risk they pose to the economy as a whole, they wrote in the Wall Street Journal newspaper.
LAQUILA, Italy: G8 leaders pledged $20 billion in aid on Friday to help poor nations feed themselves, surpassing expectations of a summit that made little ground on climate change and may spell the end of the G8 itself.
US President Barack Obama and the summits Italian host Silvio Berlusconi reflected growing consensus that the Group of Eight industrial powers, long criticized as an elite club, does not reflect the shifting patterns of global economic power.