Almost 90% of agricultural land Australian-owned

Some 89% of Australia's agricultural land is owned by Australians, according to an Australian Bureau of Statistics survey.

The figures showed 99% of agricultural businesses are Australian-owned, and 91% of water entitlements for agricultural purposes were also held by Australians or Australian companies.

The Agricultural Land and Water Ownership report states 353 million hectares of Australia's 398 million hectares of farming land is entirely Australian-owned, in the first official figures on the subject in more than 25 years.

Victoria had the lowest level of foreign ownership of farming land, with 0.8% of its 99,500 hectares of land reported as having some level of foreign ownership.

The Northern Territory had the highest level of foreign ownership, with 24% or 14 million hectares reported as having some level of foreign ownership.

Of the 353 million hectares of farming land in Australia, some 45 million hectares had some level of foreign ownership and 0.3 million hectares had an unknown ownership status.

Of the agricultural land with some foreign ownership, 168,500 hectares were owned by businesses that had less than 10% foreign ownership, 22 million hectares were owned by businesses that had between 10% and 50% foreign ownership and 23 million hectares were owned by businesses that had more than 50% foreign ownership.

It comes at a time that rural estate agents have suggested international inquiries for rural land are at their highest levels in a decade, with most interest stemming from China and the Middle East.

Of Australia's 13,700 gigalitres of water entitlements used for agricultural purposes, about 12,500 gigalitres were owned by entirely Australian owned business, 1169 gigalitres had some level of foreign ownership and 97 gigalitres had an unknown ownership status, according to the report.

The data collected by survey gives a snapshot of land ownership at December 2010.

The industry group reporting the highest proportion of Australian land ownership was the nursery and floriculture production, with 99%, or 279,000 hectares, entirely Australian-owned.

The industry group reporting the highest proportion of some level of foreign ownership (therefore the lowest proportion of Australian land ownership) was the sheep, beef cattle and grain farming group. More than 11% of this group reported some level of foreign ownership (representing nearly 44 million hectares), leaving approximately 88% or 329 million hectares entirely Australian-owned.

With the survey prompted by the opposition and Greens agitating for greater scrutiny of foreign investment in farming, Assistant Treasurer Bill Shorten said the survey showed the vast majority of agricultural resources were locally owned.

''There's going to be legitimate anxieties about this in the future. But the snapshot of the present shows we have not sold the farm, the land or the water,'' Shorten says.

Opposition spokesman for agriculture and food security John Cobb says the figures showing Australians owned 99% of agricultural businesses were skewed by not looking at the size of the businesses.

''By including every small family farm business structure with an ABN we cannot see the proportion of large businesses like the grain marketing companies or the dairy food processes that are foreign-owned,'' Cobb says.

Source: ABS