Gates who stepped down from day-to-day involvement with Microsoft in 2008 has long been looking for ways to help the worlds poorest and to address the planets environmental challenges. One of the more colorful theories pertains to Gatess strange interest in U.S. agriculture, with rumors that the former Microsoft CEO owns upward of 80 percent of farmland in the United States. Some are near cities and might end up having other uses.". Climate change is happening, and we must use all best practices to allow farmers to adapt. Published: 23:06 GMT, 15 January 2021 | Updated: 07:04 GMT, 16 January 2021. For comparison, the state of Rhode Island covers an area of 1,214 square miles. That proposed superhighway would run across a 5-mile stretch of the Belmont property. Last year, Gates vowed to give away "virtually all" of his fortune to the philanthropic foundation he runs with French Gates. They give farmers more bargaining power and allows them to jointly fund communal assets, such as secure storehouses. In a 2020 blog post, he wrote, "The rich should pay more than they currently do, and that includes Melinda and me.". There will be incentives for things like using less water, fewer chemicals, and storing more carbon. The fund recently raised $1 billion, which it is pouring into companies developing hydrogen-fueled airplanes, zero-carbon building materials, and other green innovations. Over the past three years she has trebled her farms output and increased her income 15-fold (see A life transformed). But many farmers lease at least some of the land they cultivate. In total, Mr Gates and his wife Melinda own 269,000 acres of land across 19 states, including 69,071 acres in Louisiana and 47,927 acres in Arkansas. Gates Biggest Owner of Farmland in US Now says: "Bill Gates, the billionaire founder of Microsoft, has been revealed as the biggest private owner of farmland in the US, after buying up 242,000 acres in 18 states. Gates' farmland now totals 242,000 acres. Almost 300,000 acres is a lot of land for one family or private individual to own, but it's still just a small part of the estimated 911 million acres of farmland in the US. Dr. Alan Busacca, professor emeritus at Washington State University, told Land Report at the time that the fertile land in the area was used for growing 'apples, cherries, carrots, dryland and irrigated wheat, and row and field crops'. We may earn commission if you buy from a link. This means biosludge from human waste will be spread on farms to grow more GMOs all to save the planet.. The tech billionaire, 65, owns 242,000 acres of agricultural land in 18 states His largest holdings are in Louisiana, Arkansas, Arizona and Nebraska; Gates owns total of 268,984 acres of land of . This was also invaluable. In emails, BlackRock spokesman Christopher Beattie told The Associated Press that the firm. 5. Kids in England had to wear masks at school because No10 'didn't want an argument' with Nicola Sturgeon - Health ministers knew there was no evidence to justify making kids abide by rule of 6 - but No10 'didn't Sunak bustled like a wide-eyed labrador, his tail waggier than a windscreen wiper in a downpour: HENRY Bill Gates: America's Top Farmland Owner | The Land Report, Do not sell or share my personal information. That makes him the largest landowner in the U.S. Stats show agriculture is a pretty good investment for billionaires. His portfolio is diversified, in other words. Corporate Agriculture Against Global Hunger. As of 2019, around 40 percent of American farmland is rented to tenants, who then operate on it. Africas farmers have a lot of problems, but one of the biggest is poor soil. The views expressed in the contents above are those of our users and do not necessarily reflect the views of MailOnline. The Foundation has nearly 40 million shares of Berkshire Hathaway which has a market value of over $7 billion. But the purchaser of record was a small, obscure company in Louisiana. Left to die alone like an animal: Parents who left 23-stone disabled daughter to die in her own filth are Holiday home owners in Scotland face new SNP tax hike under plans from front-runner to be new First Scotland should just self-identify as an independent country, one SNP member proposed. Bill Gates has started laying out his plans for creating a smart city in Phoenix, Arizona, science-news outlet Futurism wrote. Its goal is to help eliminate the need for animals from the meat supply by 2035, but its products rely on GMOs and heavy use of herbicides and pesticides. And in Africa, there's a particularly prominent initiative driving corporate agriculture's agenda Bill Gates's Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA). In total he owns 268,984 acres of land of all types in 19 states, including a suburb up for development - as a so-called 'smart city' - outside Phoenix, Arizona. In 2008 it launched a programme called Purchase for Progress (P4P) that targets smallholder suppliers, including those in 15 African countries. The same logic likely holds for Gates Arizona acquisitions. Farmland in those parts is valuable, commanding prices between $10,000 and $15,000 per acre, far beyond the state average of about $2,000. The billionaire tech mogul and philanthropist has quietly amassed nearly 270,000 acres of farmland across the country, but thats still a relatively small slice of the nations nearly 900 million total farm acres. Impossible Foods makes plant-based protein that can be fashioned into burgers. (Through a spokesperson, the company declined to comment for this article.). But, while Belmont might not be a smart city, it still looks like a smart investment. The Microsoft co-founder is considered the largest private owner of farmland in the country with some 269,000 acres across dozens of states, according to last years edition of the Land Report 100, an annual survey of the nations largest landowners. BlackRock is sometimes confused w/ Blackstone, which owned Invitation Homes. Most of us imagine farmers tilling the soil that has been in their families for generations. The commitment is a ten-fold increase from the foundation's . A primary proponent of this view is the Cornell Alliance for Science (CAS), founded in 2014 to "depolarize the charged debate" around genetically modified (GM) seeds. The nearby community of Buckeye has grown more than tenfold in the last 20 years. In 2008, The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation announced $306 million in grants designed to boost the yields and incomes of millions of small farmers in Africa as well as "other parts of the . ITS like having a new life, says Lucy Banda, a farmer in Mwambaso village in western Malawi. It is unclear how cheap biofuels can be but if they are cheap it can solve the aviation and truck emissions.. AGRA was set up in 2006 by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation. Amazing, if truebut its extremely not. Deploying high-yield . One of the Gates' favorite vacation homes is in the Yellowstone Club in Big Sky, Montana. In addition, the law places certain limitations on the ability of trusts to own farmland or ranchland, the letter said. *According to figures compiled by The Land Report in 2019. Michelle, has two of its largest vineyards in that AVA: Canoe Ridge Vineyard and Columbia Crest Vineyard. Not all of these owners are American; in fact, the portion of farmland that is foreign-owned has grown about 60 percent in the last decade, from 22 million acres in 2009 to 35.2 million . Introduction. According to the Winter 2020 issue of The Land Report, a quarterly magazine that tracks U.S. land sales, Bill and Melinda Gates now own 242,000 acres of farmland worth "more than $690 million . With more productive seeds we can avoid deforestation and help Africa deal with the climate difficulty they already face. The property is currently worth $130.8 million. AGRAs aim, helping small farmers become professional, is backed by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization. Late last year, Eric OKeefe was researching a mysterious recent purchase of 14,500 acres of prime Washington state farmland. The couples acquired farmlandisowned through a private investment company Cascade Investment.This company also owns shares in plant-based protein companies Beyond Meat and Impossible Foods, as well as agricultural equipment maker John Deere. He added: 'In addition, the states oldest winery, Chateau Ste. Since 2016, Gates has led Breakthrough Energy Ventures, a venture-capital fund that invests in clean-technology startups. (Related:Why is Bill Gates buying up farmland across America?). Bill Gates, the billionaire founder of Microsoft, has been revealed as the biggest private owner of farmland in the US, after buying up 242,000 acres in 18 states. And the Belmont property is located along Interstate 10, the regions major east-west artery, making it an excellent location for Amazon-style warehouse complexes. Newhouse raised his concerns about Chinese land ownership as he proposed an amendment in a new agricultural appropriations bill, H.R. Gates, in an Ask Me Anything session on Reddit last year, said his investment group was behind the purchases, and suggested it was linked to seed and biofuel development. More surprising, however, was the fact that Bill and Melinda Gates own more private farmland . Adding to the confusion, Blackstone was once a major investor in BlackRock, but sold off its stake in the 1990s. Real estate mogul and owner of the Los Angeles Rams, Stan Kroenke, owns 1.4 million acres of land in the United States, including a 124,000 acre ranch in Montana and additional land in Wyoming. 2023 NYP Holdings, Inc. All Rights Reserved, BillGatesbuys nearly $1B Heineken stake despite not being a big beer drinker, Bill Gates daughter living in $51M NYC home as she welcomes first baby, Elites want to use AI to censor political opponents, Bill Gates claims his private jet habit not part of the climate problem. AGRA farms are key suppliers, says Gudmunds. In this excerpt, Young claims that the founder of Microsoft said that 3 billion people need to be eliminated from earth, starting with Africans: "For the purpose of sterilisation and population control, there are too many people on the planet we need to get rid of. This article appeared in print under the headline Bringing Africas farms back to life, Explore the latest news, articles and features, Island-hopping cougars swim kilometres through icy water off US coast, This new version of quantum theory is even stranger than the original. The land, most of which is non-irrigated, was transferred to Red River Trust on Nov. 2 and Nov. 3 of last year. Here are all the companies owned by Bill Gates in 2022. In 2018 Gates reportedly bought about 16,000 acres in his home state of Washington, including a 14,500-acre tract in the Horse Heaven Hills region that was purchased for nearly $171 million from an insurance company that had paid $75million for it in 2010. Get the world's best independent media newsletter delivered straight to your inbox. 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But a Gates spokesperson said in a statement on Friday that the claim that hes bought the majority of the nations farmland is false, pointing to a U.S. Department of Agriculture report from February that showed there were more than 895 million total acres of farmland in the country last year. The 2,100 acre potato farm adds to his massive portfolio of farm investments. Larson makes money, and Mr. Gates gives it away., Larson and his team are famously tight-lipped. Instead, the LDS will add another 12,000 acres to its already massive land holdings, which include over 600,000 acres in Florida alone2 percent of that state's total land mass. In April of this year, Reddit users had a chance to ask Gates this very question. How fitting! How much land does he own? Opinion: Bill Gates and Warren Buffett should thank American taxpayers for their profitable farmland investments Last Updated: March 13, 2021 at 11:54 a.m. 'Gorilla Glue girl' Tessica Brown finds breast lumps befor 11-year-old reads aloud from 'pornographic' book he checked out from library at school board meeting, Chicago's top cop quits one day after woke mayor lost re-election bid, Influencer refuses to switch business class seats so family can sit together, RHOA star Drew Sidora accuses ex Ralph Pittman of cheating, mental abuse, Original Gone With The Wind script reveals secret war over slavery, cut scenes, Drake regrets disrupting someones life by name-dropping exes in his songs, Good luck 'worming' your way out of this one, Sunny Hostin Points Finger at China for COVID Crisis: Did Not Cooperate With the International Community, 'Disgraceful' Meghan, Harry 'provoked' King Charles to evict them: royal expert. The investment companys single largest acquisition of farmland came in 2017 when it paid $520 million to purchase 61 properties from the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB). While Gates appears . as well as other partner offers and accept our. The last one in this top 5 of the largest landowners is once again a large Australian farmer. This boosted Bandas annual income from $50 to $750 last year. If the nations largest farmland owner can show that farming can be both sustainable and profitable, that will make a big difference. For now, though, all that smart city talk is more than a little premature. Working closely with the World Health . AFRICA. Theres also a proposal to build a new interstate linking Phoenix to Las Vegas. As Slate financial writer Henry Grabar concluded, the proposed town of Belmont is not a city, nor is it smart, nor does the Microsoft founder appear to be involved in any meaningful way.. It was the highest priced land sale in the US that year. 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