Latvian parliament to discuss citizens' initiative to ban land sale to foreigners

The Latvian parliament will discuss citizen's initiative to prohibit selling agricultural land and forest to foreigners.

The initiative on Thursday was submitted to the parliamentary Economic, Agricultural, Environmental and Regional Policy Committee which will review it and submit a draft decision on the issue to the parliament.

A petition calling for a ban on selling land to foreigners has gathered over 10,000 signatures on the public initiatives website and therefore the parliament has an obligation to consider it.

The petition was initiated by MP Armands Krauze of the Union of the Greens and Farmers.

The ban on selling land to citizens of foreign countries was proposed in order to protect local farmers who cannot compete with large Danish, German and other European agricultural enterprises in terms of prices and possibilities to attract funding, Krauze said.

The MP noted in his application that the initiative is intended to ensure that Latvia's agricultural and forest lands remain in Latvian citizens' possession and to stop these land properties from being "sold out to foreigners and multinational investment funds." Krauze has urged the parliament to call a referendum on the issue.

The ministries of agriculture and economics said they did not support the initiative as Latvia must observe its international commitments. Endit