Tuesday April 11 2017

News Source: Global Disclosures

Focus: Foreign Investment

Type: General

Country: Australia




On the 28th of March 2017, the Australian Government issued a response to the findings and recommendations of the Senate Economic References Committee report into the Foreign Investment Review Framework. The response addresses the recommendations raised in the report, and has been coordinated and prepared by the Australian Treasury.

The Government made the following responses to the below recommendations:

  • The committee recommends that Treasury publish guidance about the foreign investment review assessment process including information on the steps and features of the process.

    Response: The Treasury will review the Foreign Investment Review Board’s website and publish additional information about the assessment and screening process for foreign investment proposals.

  • The committee recommends that the Treasury publish the Treasurer`s rationale behind both positive and negative decisions regarding foreign investment.

    Response: The Government will continue its practice of considering issuing a press release when making a decision on a significant foreign investment proposal that is in the public domain. However, the Government does not comment on matters of national security.

  • The committee recommends that the Australian Government establish a publicly available Agricultural Land Register for all foreign-owned agricultural land.

    Response: Partly agree. The Government has recognised community concern around foreign ownership of Australia’s agricultural land. On 1 July 2015, the Register of Foreign Ownership of Agricultural Land (Agricultural Land Register) was established and is administered by the Australian Taxation Office. On 7 September 2016 the Government released the first report on the Agricultural Land Register. The report included aggregated data collected through the Agricultural Land Register on the number of properties that are foreign owned, by land size, by state and territory, and by land use as at 30 June 2016.

For more information, please click the link at the top of the page.