Investors plant funds in farmland

When Graham Birch, a former portfolio manager at BlackRock, considered swapping funds for farming five years ago, his search for land spanned the globe as he looked for reasonably priced pastures.

Birch decided he wanted to manage his own farm but it became clear early on that he needed to learn more about climate, location, scale and price.

He said: “What I realised quite quickly is that it’s tempting to say, ‘let’s go find where the cheapest land is because you get more bang for your buck,’ but what you quickly discover is that land in some parts of the world is cheap for a reason.”