THE Chinese Government is buying Australian farms and Australian law offers no avenue to stop it, says Liberal Senator Bill Heffernan.
The Foreign Investment Review Board only reviews sales when the selling price is more than $230 million.
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Senator Heffernan told Parliament last week that James Cook University Director of the Centre for AusAsia Business Studies, Professor Zhangyue Zhou, said the Chinese Government was aiming to acquire land for its own food security.
"We should have some sort of oversight of who is buying and acquiring our agricultural and water resources," Senator Heffernan said in Parliament.
He told The Weekly Times a foreign government "could buy every property down the Murrumbidgee River".
Independent candidate for Wannon Katrina Rainsford has called for the Government to decide what policy Australia wanted on foreign ownership.
"Whatever your view on Prime Minister Rudd's mining tax is, the reason he thought it was needed was because most of the mining companies are foreign-owned and the Australian people need to get a resources tax out of it (mining).
"Why don't we instead fix our policy on foreign ownership before we have to have a super profits tax on our land and water resources (that are bought by foreign investors)."
Dr Rainsford said while collective investment may be required for large projects such as mining or processing, Australian farming families should be given a fair go at being able to buy and farm Australian land.
Other policies including Managed Investment Schemes had created an unfair playing field, she said.
"As a nation we should be asking, why is it fair to muck around with agriculture and water resources (with MIS) but not in other sectors?"
