CEE REPORT FLIPPING PAGES.pdf

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A back drop of strong global commodity prices has given a further boost to overall demand for farmland throughout this period. Though more recently a cooling o# of prices has taken the wind from the market and values are thought to be retracting slightly. Polish farmers have bene%ted from improved prices, preferential state run credit and grants for machinery and buildings which the shrewdest of farmers have exploited to their bene%t. This puts them in a strong position to buy or rent further land. International interest in Poland’s farmland comes from the %nancial sector and the farming sector. The former looking for tangible investments o#ering competitive market returns and the latter seeking to expand successful European farm business models in a stable country with strong economic and political fundamentals. Both groups have maintained an interest in Poland’s land market and have been actively involved.

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Driving this was sales at the domestic level which have been buoyed by state sell-o$s under recent legislation which initiated a process of land reclamation from farmers leasing state owned land over on area of 414ha. The State gave tenants a right of pre-emption, in return for handing back 30%of the land they were leasing. This meant the land handed back to the State has subsequently (and is) been sold through restricted local auctions to local farmers resident in the immediate area. Simultaneously those companies leasing land, and having given back 30%of their leased area have gone on and acquired or are in the process of buying out their leasehold from the State resulting in a particularly active time for the Polish landmarket.

CEE Land Market Brief 2014 13