Rural land prices

An article in The Australian today suggests land prices have risen 6% pa and suggests why RFF is a useful alternative investment. I hope the company make use of this new survey in presentations.

"The value of Australian farmland has grown by an average of 6 per cent annually over the past 20 years, making it one of the best-returning and most resilient long-term asset classes available to investors.
A comprehensive Rural Bank study released today, which examines 220,000 farm sales valued at $124 billion across Australia over the past 20 years, confirms the underlying strength of agricultural property values, despite droughts, floods and sector downturns.
Rural Bank chief executive Alexandra Gartmann questioned why, when Australian farmland was such an attractive long-term investment, so few Australian superannuation funds included the alternative asset class in portfolios.
She said it was perplexing and disappointing. “When we talk about Australian agriculture, this report shows that if you are in there with a long-term view, this is absolutely an asset to invest in; farmland is a great wealth creation opportunity,” Ms Gartmann said. “Foreign companies and pension funds obviously recognise this because they have been buying so many rural properties in Australia in recent years, with some then contracting out management of the farming operations on the land so they are just exposed to farmland value gains."