Jim Rogers also has been telling people to plow into Russian equities for many years now because "they are a creditor nation". He also said in 1987 market crash that "he wanted to short but didn't think that the exchange will even be there to pay him out as he predicted a total economic collapse".
Also he has been︀ Bullish on Commodities for the last few decades. If you keep saying it, eventually you︁ will be right. It does not make you smart.
The guy is a perpetual doomer︂ predicting total collapse of the entire world for many decades. So far he has been︃ 100% wrong, anybody following him would have underperformed in the good times, and losing -100%︄ in the bad times.
Funnily enough I actually read an interview with him from last︅ week in which he is gleefully talking about his amazing commodities predictions, and didn't say︆ a single word about his awful Russia picks that resulted in -100% loss. Just google︇ "Jim Rogers Russia" for a nice 15 minutes walk down memory lane...
And regarding his︈ farming thoughts: Obviously he has not been talking to any farmers lately.
I talked with︉ actual farmers and it seems from my very limited research that it is much smarter︊ to buy the land and lease it to a farmer for a guaranteed yield, rather︋ than farm it yourself and take the commodity price swing risk\weather-rain-drought risk\machinery costs\fertilizer costs swings\etc.︌ Not to mention this literally means you put all your eggs in one basket =︍ one piece of land in one country in which you are also exposed to land︎ grabs by some new government\regulation\tax changes and the country has you by the balls- you️ can't sell your land in a hurry if you need to escape. This also comes back to a lack of liquidity- farms\land take a long time to sell especially in times of crisis when you need the money most, and it will take a few years just to break even on your investment even if you are making 25% p.a. You need to be paid a premium for that lack of liquidity.
I'm sure it can be a good investment if you know what you are doing and are diversified enough.
Tell that to families that invested and built Shanghai, making billions until the communists rose to︃ power. Since I know you like books I highly recommend you read "The Last Kings︄ of Shanghai" about this particular subject and sad tale. The biggest investment risk - as︅ anybody that invested in Russia found out - is political\regulatory risk and the only way︆ to avoid it is to diversify.
