The Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB) has signed an agreement to acquire the assets of Assiniboia Farmland LP, a fund that owns and manages a portfolio of farmland in Saskatchewan.
The CPPIB’s equity investment will be up to $128 million, pending final adjustments. The transaction is expected to close in January 2014.
Assiniboia’s diversified portfolio consists of approximately 115,000 acres of farmland, representing one of the largest investable farmland portfolios in Canada. The key crops produced by the portfolio are wheat, barley and canola.
“We see this as an attractive opportunity for CPPIB to invest in an established platform of high-quality farmland in a strategically significant agricultural region of Canada,” says André Bourbonnais, senior vice-president, private investments, with the CPPIB. “Farmland is an attractive asset class that has historically delivered stable, risk-adjusted returns, and the global outlook for agriculture in general is positive due to increasing demand for agricultural products.”
In 2012, the CPPIB launched its agriculture investment program, which will initially focus on farmland opportunities in Canada, the United States, Australia, New Zealand and Brazil.
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