|
Great Southern Group is a group of Australian companies that is notable as the country's largest agribusiness managed investment scheme (MIS) business. The company was founded in 1987 and became a public company in 1999. It expanded its MIS business rapidly in the 2000s, supported by favourable tax regulations for these types of investments. Most of the Group's business was in plantation forestry to supply woodchips for the pulp and paper industry, but in the 2000s it diversified into high-value timbers, beef cattle, olives, viticulture, and almond production. The company's after-tax profit peaked at A$132 million in 2006, but by 2008 had deteriorated to a A$63 million loss. The Great Southern companies attracted debate and criticism associated with the operation of managed investment schemes generally, and the environmental performance of their Tiwi Islands operation in particular. In 2009, as a result of worsening economic conditions and regulatory issues, the company was placed in administration. The collapse of Great Southern Group, in conjunction with the failure of another high-profile agribusiness company, Timbercorp, led to two separate Australian parliamentary committee inquiries into the MIS industry. ==Business activities== The Great Southern Group in 2008 formed Australia's largest managed agribusiness investment scheme operation.〔〔 The company comprised a parent entity, Great Southern Plantations Limited (from 2007 renamed Great Southern Limited),〔Great Southern (2007), p. 1〕 and over forty subsidiaries, almost all wholly owned. Those subsidiaries held or operated Great Southern's businesses, including providing management services.〔Great Southern (2008), pp. 27, 127, 128〕 At the centre of Great Southern's operations were management investment schemes (referred to as MIS schemes). MIS schemes are a mechanism by which investors' funds are pooled to invest in a common business enterprise. A "responsible entity" (such as Great Southern) controls the routine administration of the investments. In primary production schemes such as those managed by Great Southern, investors are the growers of products (such as forestry plantations), with an agreement with the company to manage the investment "to plant, establish and maintain the trees until they are harvested at maturity". Investors in Great Southern generally purchased lots (typically of 1 hectare) on land owned or leased by Great Southern.〔Austock Securities (2008), p. 2〕〔Underwood (2007), p. 270〕 Thus investors owned the plantations, but the land assets belonged to the company. While investors owned individual woodlots, risks and returns were distributed across all investors in individual projects, with growers sharing "the average yield at harvest for the entire Project...rather than the return from their individual woodlot".〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Great Southern 1998–2003 Plantations Projects: Understanding your investment returns )〕 These were not high rates of return for the length of investment involved. Some of the schemes relied upon the rationale that investors would retire and therefore receive income from the scheme when their marginal tax rate was lower than at the time of initial investment. Based on this premise some schemes were claiming a rate of return after tax of eight to nine percent.〔 Others suggested the schemes were a poor investment likely to achieve only six percent return. Returns to investors comprised a tax deduction in the year in which they bought the products,〔 and returns from the sale of produce over the life of the project,〔Underwood (2007), p. 269〕 which was typically at the point of harvest 10–12 years later for plantations, "and up to 23 years for horticultural projects such as almonds".〔Austock Securities, p. 3〕 Great Southern would deduct management fees from the final sale value.〔 A typical forestry investment in the early 2000s involved an initial payment of $3000 for one-third of a hectare woodlot, yielding a $2900 tax deduction at that time. Returns on harvesting depended on many variables; Great Southern forecast that investors would recoup their original investment and a further return of between $1923 and $4569 per woodlot, however early schemes did not achieve these figures on the basis of the timber sales, with some resulting in woodchip sales of only around A$1500, half the value of what was originally invested. Investors received their returns when the product (usually woodchip) was harvested and sold.〔 While the majority of Great Southern's activity was in the sale of managed investment schemes, in 2007 it diversified into funds management through the purchase of Rural Funds Management Ltd,〔Great Southern (2007), p. 5〕 retaining its diversified agricultural assets fund and offering a new share fund and a blended property fund. In addition to retailing MIS products to investors, Great Southern also provided loans to investors wanting to borrow to invest. By 2009 its loan book comprised 14,500 loans with an average value of approximately A$50,000. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Great Southern Group」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|