A July 2008 report from the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis (covering 303 counties in Montana, the Dakotas, Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan) says that during 2001-2007 half these counties saw farmland prices more than double. Read the rest of this entry »
Farmers will be paid $3.50 per metric ton of carbon sequestered. Actually the article doesn’t say “farmers,” it says “landowners,” but possibly in this area they are generally equivalent. “The carbon offsets to be purchased through this program will be the result of changes in farming and ranching practices instituted by local landowners as part of a Section 319 Clean Water Initiative…” I infer that they’re being paid for something they were going to do anyway. I have no ideas how much $3.50/ton is in terms of acres or labor hours.
Apparently the farmers are being paid to change their practices. Had they already been farming sustainably, would they still be eligible to be paid?
Source:
WFEC to sponsor State’s First Carbon Sequestration Pilot Program, Sep 3, 2008 2:08 PM
Tags: carbon sequestration, Oklahoma
From Rediff India Abroad (”Singur turns Bengal promoters generous” Aug 29 2008″)
Today, Bengal Aerotropolis Projects Ltd, builder of the state’s only private airport and related economic zone at Durgapur, 160 km from Kolkata, indicated it would pay Rs 7.5 lakh to Rs 10 lakh an acre for the 3,500-odd acres that it intends to acquire there along with attractive additional incentives like annuity to land losers for five years, training and jobs for one person per displaced family and alternative land up to a limit of 6 cottahs (1 cottah = 720 sq ft).
This is 25 to 30 per cent more than the current price of land there even if the additional benefits were not taken into account, said an investor with an industrial project and park in the region.
Rs 7.5 Lakh seems to equate to about $21,000, so if this is 30% higher than the current price, we can conclude that agricultural land goes for at least about $16,000/acre. This is considered agricultural land, tho it also contains dwellings. It would be unusual to find agricultural land in the U. S. selling for as much, but the presence of dwellings and the greater population density of India makes the comparison poor.
Tags: Durgapur, India, land prices
US Dep’t of Agriculture publishes annual surveys of agricultural land rents and land values, at the county level. Here’s data for North Dakota, indicating rents are something like 5% of stated land value. Of course, landowners expect not only the 5%, but some increase in land price too.
It’s not clear that this is done on an annual basis for other states. Thanks to Land20 (”Buy land. It isn’t just for the extraordinarily wealthy. It is for all Americans, rich or poor.”) for the link.