“The attraction that people have to investing in farmland is that it tends to be countercyclical to the stock market. It’s a hedging strategy,” said Daniel Bigelow, a professor of agricultural economics at Montana State University, who previously served as a USDA research economist. In other words, when the economy is struggling, the value of farmland generally doesn’t depreciate.
Public records suggest Cascade Investments has bought its farmland through a web of at least 22 limited liability shell companies across the country. These shell companies have made it difficult to find out where and how much farmlandGateses own even for local farmers, like John S. Quarterman, a farmer and landowner who grows okra, corn, squash and other vegetables in Lowndes County on the southern edge of Georgia.
NBC News also found that another 6,500 acres in north Florida are owned by yet another company, Suwannee River Terra, which was also started with an address in Kirkland and an email address from the Bill and Melinda Gates Investment Firm, which is now registered to the current chief counsel of Oak River Farms with a mailing address in Kansas, according to property records.
“Well, you’d think, if you're looking for somebody with enough capital to try that, he would go first. Right? But he didn't,” Quarterman said. “He never did anything that different from before he got here and what other farmers were doing nearby."
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