investing in food/agriculture

barings global agriculture fund

Easy way in is via ETFs which track Corn, Sugar, Wheat, Soya etc. Also some more broad based such as Agriculture. Most are dollar denominated so you might want to hedge out the currency risk too. On HL website search under E on the ETF list.

Sorry for being pig ignorant but not a hardened investor.
2
ETFs"?
"hedge out the currency risk too"? How?
"HL website"

my theory is that we will always need food and even more so in the coming years, is this a sound(ish) reason for investing?

i would say no. i bought some oil/commodities etfs about a year ago thinking the price could only go one way. the problem is everyone agreed so the etf hasnt really gone up. im a bit clueless as well tbh but i think the etf only goes up in value if the price of the commodity goes up more than expected if u see what i mean.

i agree the price of food is only going to rise in the coming years but i dont think buying etfs is going to help u much imo.

p.s. etf stands for exchange traded fund (i think!). u can get them leveraged to varying amounts so that u win or lose more if the price changes.

ETFs and ETCs - short for exchange traded Funds / Commodities.
Generally track an index (Eg FTSE 100 tracker) or the price of a commodity (Gold, Sugar, Corn, Wheat etc). Normally cheaper than a traditional fund, as these have higher management charges for being actively managed.

HL is hargreaves lansdown, a fund supermarket where you can normally get funds cheaper than direct from the fund themselves. (normally to buy a fund you will get charged 5% initial fee, but fund supermarkets often rebate most of this). Several other fund supermarkets out there too.

Alternatively buy 1000 loaves of bread on Boxing day, and wait for the price of bread to go up and sell them when you are in profit.

thank you Billy

Potash,Monsanto an Mosaic are agri plays also pesticide companies

Think these will be big winners in 2010

Denis makes a good point here.  I would avoid ETFs in commodities as they suffer from negative roll yield in many cases.  For example, "Oil" is $80 and you think it's going up, but the six month forward price is already $100.  This price will "roll down" to 'spot' and you'll lose quite a lot even if "Oil" is $85 in six months.

I recommend equities in processors as most of the front-end commodity shares are already pricing in decades of increases.  The key is what happends to the wheat and corn etc after that.  You have to think that the food needs machines to process it etc.  - who makes those?  Look at machinery manufacturers, processors, companies with a lot of land etc.

Yeah avoid commodity ETFs like the plague as they get boned by contract rollovers so even if the price is going up the ETF is likely to go down.

Buy wheat

Selling a wheat ETF might do well right now.

Biodiesel Joined: 04 May 05
Replies: 1146 25 Dec 09 01:59 
Potash,Monsanto an Mosaic are agri plays also pesticide companies

Think these will be big winners in 2010