Australia blocks largest private farm sale to Chinese over national interest
The refusal to sell to the Chinese-based Dakang Australia Holdings and Australian-listed company Australian Rural Capital is only a preliminary decision
Citing national interest, the Australian government on Friday blocked a Chinese-led consortium from buying the nation’s largest private land holding, a collection of Outback cattle ranches bigger than South Korea.
Treasurer Scott Morrison said he was concerned that the land owned by a pioneering dynasty is more than 1 per cent of Australia’s total land area and 2 per cent of agricultural land. He also worried that the land holding was so big that it was difficult for Australian bidders to compete.
The refusal to sell to the Chinese-based Dakang Australia Holdings and Australian-listed company Australian Rural Capital is only a preliminary decision and Dakang has until Tuesday to respond. The price tag is A$371 million (HK$2.1 billion).
S. Kidman & Co Ltd owns 10 cattle ranches, a bull breeding stud and a feed lot covering 101,411 sq km in four states. That’s an area bigger than South Korea and almost as big as the US state of Virginia.
Kidman chairman John Crosby was not immediately available for comment.
The government in November blocked the first attempt to sell the Adelaide-based company founded by beef baron Sir Sidney Kidman in 1899, and now owned by his descendants.