Down on the farm, investors see big potential

[IDemo]

By BERNARD CONDON, AP Business Writer – 1 day ago

Braden Janowski has never planted seeds or brought in a harvest. He doesn't even own overalls.

Yet when 430 acres of Michigan cornfields was auctioned last summer, it was Janowski, a brash, 33-year-old software executive, who made the winning bid. It was so high — $4 million, 25 percent above the next-highest — that some farmers stood, shook their heads and walked out. And Janowski figures he got the land cheap.

"Corn back then was around $4," he says from his office in Tulsa, Okla., stealing a glance at prices per bushel on his computer. Corn rose to almost $8 in June and trades now at about $7.

A new breed of gentleman farmer is shaking up the American heartland. Rich investors with no ties to farming, no dirt under their nails, are confident enough to wager big on a patch of earth — betting that it's a smart investment because food will only get more expensive around the world.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hUhPHlEmebT-YDs76ci1bcoEO4QA?docId=a3f71e3d8075413487a5abf3e1facb27

[msongs]

1. why not he will probably make millions in government farmer welfare subsidies nt

[rurallib]

2. I have been looking for corporations to get into farming big time

control the production, control the price, control the profit.
and (as noted) pressure congress to pay those subsidies.

[zeemike]

3. Actually they have been for some time.

Archer Daniels Midland produces something like 80% of what we consume.
Farming is big busness....the family farmer has been run off the land.

[Dappleganger]

4. Yet they still vote for the republicans every single time.