Australia's richest woman Gina Rinehart and Chinese developer Shanghai CRED have agreed on a deal to jointly purchase S. Kidman & Co, the country's largest private land holding.
The deal, announced on Sunday, was worth $A365 million ($NZ386 million).
Rinehart's Hancock Prospecting will own 67% and Shanghai CRED 33% of Australian Outback Beef Pty Ltd, a new joint venture created to buy Kidman in a bid to overcome government concerns about foreign interests buying the cattle empire.
In April this year, the Australian government rejected a $A371 million bid by a consortium headed by Shanghai CRED and Hunan Dakang Pasture Farming Co Ltd, alongside a minority 20% Australian interest, the group's second rejection in six months.
Australian Treasurer Scott Morrison said the sale of Kidman's vast holdings - about the same size as South Korea - to the Chinese buyers was not in the national interest.
Domestic ownership of agriculture is seen as crucial for Australia to cash in on global food demand and to keep tax revenues onshore.
Rinehart, who has close ties with ruling conservative lawmakers, said Kidman "is an important part of Australia's pioneering and entrepreneurial history".
Founded more than 100 years ago, Kidman has an average beef herd carrying capacity of 185,000 cattle and pastoral leases covering 101,000 sq km.
The company has already agreed to sell its Anna Creek Station in South Australia, which makes up a quarter of its land holding, to an Australian buyer to help assuage government concerns. Anna Creek is adjacent to the Woomera weapons testing site, a concern noted by Morrison in rejecting the sale.
The Hancock deal is reliant on the separate sale of Anna Creek being completed. Proceeds from the sale of that and another station will be paid to Kidman and retained in the company for the benefit of Australian Outback Beef.
"We welcome the significant investment proposed in addition to the purchase price and are confident that the Kidman business will be in good hands,' Kidman Chairman John Crosby said.
A source familiar with the Dakang bid told Reuters in late August that it was considering a fresh bid of its own with potential domestic investors.
Rinehart would be a formidable opponent if Dakang pushed ahead. She is Australia's richest woman with assets worth $US11.1 billion ($NZ1.5 billion), according to Forbes, largely tied to iron ore assets.
In August, she named former lawmaker Sophia Mirabella to a senior role at Hancock Prospecting. She is also close to Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce, who welcomes the deal.
Political reaction to deal
Joyce said he made a point of not talking to the mining magnate or her staff about the bid. "I want to make sure this is completely and utterly at arms-length," he told ABC radio on Monday.
The Nationals leader said he liked the idea of an Australian-majority bid for Kidman and other land assets, but a decision was up to the Foreign Investment Review Board.
"I want to drive around the countryside, drive around the suburbs saying this is overwhelmingly owned by Australians."
He rejected a claim by independent senator Jacqui Lambie that the Chinese were using Reinhart to control Kidman.
"I think she's talking out of her hat," he said.
Finance Minister Mathias Cormann said it would be great if such a significant asset as Kidman was kept in majority Australian hands. "But there's a process to go through and I'll just let this play out."
One Nation leader Pauline Hanson celebrated the news on her Facebook page, saying she had faith in Rinehart's business capabilities and her love for Australia and its assets.
"I believe Australians will be happy with this outcome given the vast majority of the company remains in the hands of Australia," Hanson wrote.
Labor senator Doug Cameron noted Rinehart's generous donations to the Nationals Party.
"You should ask her best mate Barnaby Joyce. He'll probably know all about what Gina Rinehart is doing," he told reporters in Canberra.
"Gina Rinehart had to hire a tip-truck to tip the money off to the National Party during the last election."
Nationals senator Bridget McKenzie welcomed Ms Rinehart's bid as a positive step forward.
"I think it's always positive that we back our own," she said.
Independent senator Nick Xenophon believes her intervention is a middle way which makes sense.
And he doubts suggestions Ms Rinehart will be controlled by her Chinese minority partners.
"I think Gina Rinehart is pretty much uncontrollable."
Xenophon believes reforms to foreign investment are still needed, saying existing rules are as clear as mud and as weak as water.
Former Labor treasurer Wayne Swan suggested there was some risk in letting investors with interests in other industries like mining getting involved, and that the potential impact on agricultural product pricing.
"I think we need to be concerned when we get monopolies taking over large parts of our economy."
- Reuters and AAP
