.

NEWS AND VIEWS THAT IMPACT LIMITED CONSTITUTIONAL GOVERNMENT

"There is danger from all men. The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man living with
power to endanger the public liberty." - - - - John Adams

Saturday, November 21, 2015

Chinese Communists are buying up Australia



Corporatism on Steroids

  • Once upon a time the Chinese Communist Party woke up and said, "You know, Communist enforced poverty really sucks. Let's go make money." 
  • From that point the Communists have fully embraced Benito Mussolini's corporatism. So-called "private" Chinese companies work hand-in-glove with the Communist Party to buy up private property all over the world and expand China's political influence. 
  • In this story the Australians are more than happy to sell off their birthright to a foreign dictatorship.


(Farmland Grab.org)  -  Australia’s largest and oldest dairy farm has been effectively sold for $220 million to Chinese owners. Herman Shao-ming Hu and Kenny Zhang are finalising the purchase of a majority interest in the 190-year-old Van ­Diemen’s Land Company (VDL) in Tasmania. 

The near-completed deal comes in the same week as federal parliament prepares to ­debate the Chinese-Australia free-trade agreement, and will be a test of Treasurer Scott Morrison’s attitude to foreign investment. 

Mr Hu and Mr Zhang through their respective companies, ­Ryoden Development and the Australia-registered Waratah Corporation, will each buy about 35 per cent of VDL from current owner New Zealand’s New Plymouth Council. 

In 2012, the Lempriere group organised the sale of Australia’s largest cotton farm and irrigation water holder, Cubbie Station, to another Chinese company, Shandong Ruyi, for $240m, retaining a 20 per cent stake for itself.

See our other articles:
Communist Chinese on buying spree in Australia
and
Bulgaria becomes a Chinese Food Colony

Hong Kong-based Mr Hu and former Howard government communications minister Richard Alston, chairman of Waratah Corporation, visited Tasmania last week to inspect the 25 dairy farms owned by VDL. 

They met Premier Will Hodgman and State Growth and ­Energy Minister Matthew Groom. Neither Mr Hu, who is a deputy of China’s National ­People’s Congress and chairman of Hong Kong’s City University, or Australian-educated mainland Chinese property developer and coal billionaire Kenny Zhang, have any previous agricultural interests. But both Chinese companies have access to distribution and marketing channels in China and Hong Kong, where any food and farm products they produce in Australia can be sold directly. 

VDL’s new Chinese owners plan to further expand and ­develop its farms and associated infrastructure to focus on China’s growing demand for infant baby formula and milk-based health drinks for its ageing population. There are also suggestions the company may build its own milk powder plant to enable all its milk production, processing and distribution systems to remain within its own networks. 

The Bureau of Meteorology also has an air-testing station at Cape Grim, while VDL’s Woolnorth farm is already home to 62 wind turbines, majority-owned by another Chinese company, the Shenhua Energy Group Mr Zheng, managing director of Waratah Corporation which started life as his first business Waratah Paint, earlier this year flagged his move out of investment in the slowing mining and resources sector into agribusiness in Australia and New Zealand. “With the domestic food safety problem becoming more and more serious, most Chinese are paying more attention to safety and healthy food,” Mr Zheng wrote in a recent message on his company website. 

The Tasmanian government, which did not respond to requests for comment yesterday, is understood to be thrilled by the Chinese interest — and much-needed ­foreign capital — into Australia’s smallest and poorest state and its booming dairy industry. There are also hopes other Chinese investors may now invest in Tasmania’s ageing container port at Launceston or at Burnie — as well as in direct shipping services between Tasmania and China. 

None of the companies ­involved in the sale would comment.

Read More . . . .



No comments: