South Africa To Ban Land Sale to Foreigners

The South African government has announced plans to fast-track a bill barring foreigners from buying land.

The Regulations of Land Holdings Bill would mean foreigners will only be able to lease land for 30 years.

However it will not allow for the expropriation of land currently owned by people from outside the nation. An estimated 7% of land in South Africa is owned by foreigners.

The government hopes that the bill will become law within five years.

The weaker rand and lenient property laws make the country, which prides itself as the most developed economy in Africa, a top choice for property buyers from abroad.

But now the government is looking to put a stop to that trend.

Minister of Rural Development and Land Reform, Gugile Nkwinti, announced that within the next five years, purchase of new land would be restricted to locals only under the new bill.

The department said the bill would be submitted to parliament in November, and could come into law in 2019.

via BBC

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Alfonso Esparza

Alfonso Esparza

Senior Currency Analyst at Market Pulse
Alfonso Esparza specializes in macro forex strategies for North American and major currency pairs. Upon joining OANDA in 2007, Alfonso Esparza established the MarketPulseFX blog and he has since written extensively about central banks and global economic and political trends. Alfonso has also worked as a professional currency trader focused on North America and emerging markets. He has been published by The MarketWatch, Reuters, the Wall Street Journal and The Globe and Mail, and he also appears regularly as a guest commentator on networks including Bloomberg and BNN. He holds a finance degree from the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education (ITESM) and an MBA with a specialization on financial engineering and marketing from the University of Toronto.
Alfonso Esparza