Politics decides land values

11 December 1998

‘Politics decides land values’

POLITICS, rather than productivity, plays the key role in the value of farmland, reports the Financial Times in a report by its property correspondent.

She says Government intervention in the price of commodities has been directly reflected in agricultural land values.

For this reason, there are likely to be further drops in UK agricultural land values. This is because changes to the common agricultural policy after 2000 are designed to make underlying farmland prices much more sensitive to the market values of the commodities they produce.

She sees the USA going down the same route as the federal Government unwinds its intervention.

Land prices are also set to fall in eastern and central Europe when these states join the European Union.

• Financial Times 11/12/98 page 28