Brazil landowners group contests curb on foreign land ownership

Sao Paulo

BRAZIL'S Rural Society of landowners filed a case with the country's Supreme Court on Thursday seeking to overturn restrictions on the amount of land foreigners can purchase.

The attorney general's office tightened restrictions on foreign land ownership in Brazil in 2010, an action that officials privately said was mostly aimed at restricting China's access to untapped farmland in the country, the world's No 2 soya bean producer.

Gustavo Junqueira, president of the Rural Society, said that in trying to reverse the 2010 land restrictions, the society did not seek to allow the purchase of large swathes of land by countries such as China or by sovereign wealth funds. "We want people, investors and companies linked to agriculture to have the right to invest," he said in an interview, adding that existing laws would prevent the concentration …