Pengxin’s outrageous profiteering attempt

Written By: - Date published: 12:00 pm, June 29th, 2012 - 21 comments
Categories: farming, overseas investment - Tags:

Shanghai Pengxin’s bid to buy the Crafar Farms was accepted the second time around because of promises that it (actually, Landcorp) would invest in building the farms’ productivity in a way a New Zealand buyer couldn’t. Instead, they immediately turned around and tried to sell 3 of the farms at an outrageous profit – offering to on sell to iwi 3 farms that include sacred areas at a 50% premium over what it is paying.

Pengxin has shown it has no intent of being bound to the commitments it has made to the Overseas Investment Office. This should aid the New Zealand group suing to stop the sale of the farms to Pengxin no end.

In a huge coincidence, Russel Norman’s bill that would ban farm sales overseas just drawn from the members’ ballot yesterday. In light of Pengxin’s behaviour, National’s going to have to give us some bloody good reasons for voting it down.

21 comments on “Pengxin’s outrageous profiteering attempt ”

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  1. mike e 1
    29 June 2012 at 12:34 pm

    As the global economy continues to stay in depression except for a small number of countries.
    the spotlight turns to China and its economy,
    The various types of companies mostly state owned.
    Profit is missing from most companies.
    What China is doing is taking much of the Worlds resources And manufacturing as possible
    ( behaving like a monopoly)
    In the future when they have wiped out most of the competition through uncompetitive practices they will be able to make huge profits.

    • darkhorse 1.1
      30 June 2012 at 10:22 am

      Except they will have no customers to sell to mike e. That is what Germany has done to Europe. Europe is not a Greek problem it is a German Problem. We have a China Problem.

      There is no point in running a highly subsidised economy that destroys your customers ability to produce and earn while at the same time loaning them money to buy your highly subsidised goods.

      That is not trade.

      The end outcome of this strategy will be more like the highland clearance than anything else. Once dispossessed we will be driven from our land. It happened to the Scots – it happened to the Maori and every other indigenous population – it is now happening to the majority of us.

      John Key doesn’t care – only money matters to him – he is not a New Zealander he is an Internationalist and he is an agent for the new Corporate Feudalism. This is the psychopathic behaviour of the compulsively acquisitive – ultimately self-destructive but the pathologically greedy can’t see that they are blinded by the need to own things and by their own sense of superiority.

      We the sheeple allow it to happen by our apathy.

      • Bill 1.1.1
        30 June 2012 at 3:04 pm

        John Key is no internationalist ‘darkhorse’. Globalist, perhaps. But internationalist? Absolutely not.

        • darkhorse 1.1.1.1
          30 June 2012 at 5:57 pm

          Wouldn’t split hairs with you on the semantics Bill but yes maybe a Globalist perhaps more accurately a corporatist, definitely not a nationalist =- though possibly an Hawaiian

          • Bill 1.1.1.1.1
            30 June 2012 at 6:59 pm

            It’s not mere semantics darkhorse. Internationalism has a very long history and is a term and idea firmly rooted in the left.

  2. ghostwhowalksnz 2
    29 June 2012 at 12:59 pm

    The bid is still under legal challenge which could rule the OIO approval invalid , for a second time.

    Interestingly the sale to iwi offer was conditional on them withdrawing from the legal action. Could they have wanted to lock them into buying the milk as well so they were glorified sharemilkers ?

    Chinas milk production is twice that of New Zealand just out of interest. And Chinas production is half that of India.
    If they wanted security of supply of a insignificant food product you think they would be paying us to show them how…. oops Fonterra tried that which ended with dead babies

  3. bbfloyd 3
    29 June 2012 at 1:02 pm

    “national going to have to give us some bloody good reasons for voting it down”… They’ve gotten away with using specious bullshit for the last four years…. what is going to be different this time?

    Is the news media going to actually report this accurately? Or are we just going to get more of the obsequious cheerleading going on now?

  4. Jackal 4
    29 June 2012 at 1:25 pm

    I hate to point this out but… the sixteen dairy farms consist of an area the size of Hamilton, comprising of around 7892 Hectares. The two Bennydale farms are 1687 Hectares and the Taharua Road, Rangitaiki farm on the Napier Taupo Highway is 1751 hectares. So that’s 3438 Hectares or 43.5% of the total land area Shanghai Pengxin apparently purchased for $210. Therefore the actual price equivalent to what Shanghai Pengxin is believed to have paid for the three farms in question is $91.35 million, well above the amount offered.

    • McFlock 4.1
      29 June 2012 at 2:13 pm

      land valuing isn’t my area, but it would depend on the development and use of the land, not just the total area. e.g. how much of them are gorse or native bush?

      • ghostwhowalksnz 4.1.1
        30 June 2012 at 9:27 am

        The iwi, who would have their own valuation from their attempts to buy it off the bank, seem to have that number allready

  5. fender 5
    29 June 2012 at 1:27 pm

    Makes Pita Sharples look rather silly after his trip to China performing impromptu haka etc. declaring Shanghai Pengxin partnership a good thing, a 180 degree change to his earlier stance. He was on the 6 oclock news stating how Maori were to be given some of the farmland back. Guess he was severly mistaken and a huge rise in the cost was somehow lost in translation.

    • prism 5.1
      30 June 2012 at 7:06 pm

      Don’t sneer at Pita Sharples. Maori are attempting to grow their bit of the economy and though we don’t like some Chinese moves we including Maori have to keep talking and trying to advance business projects.

  6. tracey 6
    29 June 2012 at 1:49 pm

    be warned this is what will happen if a new govt wants to buy back the energy companies, in a couple of short years, notwithstanding GFC and recession the price will have risen enormously.

    • darkhorse 6.1
      30 June 2012 at 10:30 am

      The government can buy the assets back at what ever price it wants to pay. It is the government it makes the rules. Rule making can work two ways for the people or against the people =- presently they are working against us. That must change.

      These sales are theft not just of an community asset but of a cornersrtone of our nation’s future.

  7. Bill 7
    29 June 2012 at 3:22 pm

    A private land owner attempting to convert land ownership into as much money as possible? Who’d ‘av thunk it?

    Oh yeah that’s right. Only every other land owner of the past couple of hundred years or so is all. (And that’s a very generous 50% approximation)

  8. Spam 8
    30 June 2012 at 3:18 pm

    I’m sure Michael Faye’s consortium had purely altruistic motives, and would not have tried to sell any of the farms, instead donating them to charity.

  9. Macro 9
    30 June 2012 at 3:57 pm

    “National’s going to have to give us some bloody good reasons for voting it down.”

    James, when has “reason” ever been a motivation for action by this crowd??