Business mogul and philanthropist Bill Gates has acquired a monumental farmland portfolio spread across 18 states in the United States, becoming the biggest farmland owner in the country, as per media reports.

The Microsoft CEO, who is currently the fourth richest person in the world, has amassed 242,000 in farmland acreage. This is followed by the Offutt family, with 190,000 acres, and Stewart and Lynda Resnick with 190,000 acres.

Gates and his wife Melinda are the owners of 268,984 acres of land, the biggest chunk of it being farmland. This comes along with 25,750 acres of transitional land and 1,234 acres of recreational land, according to the Land Report.

The report revealed that Gates holds the biggest landholdings in Louisiana (69,071 acres), Arkansas (47,927 acres), and Nebraska (20,588 acres). His net worth stands at $121 billion.

Earlier in 2008, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation announced $306 million in grants to boost high-yield, sustainable agriculture across sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia.

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