Saudi Arabia plans to set up a firm to invest in agriculture overseas within two months to ensure food security.

The new company, a partnership between the public sector and domestic private companies, is part of a programme to ensure adequate food supplies to the Gulf country at cheaper prices, Agriculture Minister Fahd Balghunaim said.

The firm will focus on items that either cannot be grown in the kingdom such as rice and sugar or need plenty of water supplies such as wheat, barley and animal fodder, the minister said.

Saudi Arabia said it would start reducing purchases of wheat from local farmers by 12.5 per cent per year from this year, abandoning a 30-year programme to grow wheat that achieved self-sufficiency but depleted water supplies.

Riyadh's plan was to start importing wheat next year and move to 100 per cent reliance on foreign purchases by 2015.

The government said it would provide land for stockpiling basic staples and would increase investments to ensure its long-term food security.