With a view to boosting the agricultural output and reviving the rural economy, Bangladesh Bank (BB) has raised agricultural and rural loan disbursement target by 7.98 percent to Taka 28,391 crore for the current financial year (FY22).
The annual Agricultural and Rural Credit Policy and Program for the financial year 2021-2022 has been announced to combat the adverse effects of Covid-19 pandemic and to achieve the government's three prime objectives of sustainable development goals (SDGs), according to a BB press release issued on Thursday.
In the immediate past fiscal year 2020-2021, the central bank had a disbursement target of Taka 26,292 crore for the agricultural and rural sector.
"Achieving government's three prime SDG objectives - eradication of poverty, ensuring safe and nutritious food and developing rural economy-is the main target of the policy," said the BB in its media release.
Considering pandemic situation and the increased demand of agricultural and rural credit, disbursement target for the state-owned and specialized commercial banks is fixed at Taka 11,045 crore and for the private and foreign commercial banks at Taka 17,346 crore.
In the FY21 all the scheduled commercial banks disbursed agricultural and rural credit worth Taka 25,511.35 crore against the target of Taka 26,292 crore, which is approximately 97.03 percent of the affixed target.
The agricultural and rural credits were disbursed among 30,55,166 persons in total of which 16,05,947 woman borrowers have received Taka 9,287.96 crore. Beside this, 22,45,512 small and marginal farmers have received around Taka 17,639.93 crore from different banks. Moreover, Taka 33.96 crore was disbursed among 7,796 farmers of char, haor and less developed areas of the country.
To ensure the food security of the people and to develop a sustainable agricultural credit system, there are some new inclusions in the current agricultural credit policy. Some of them are Credit Norms for rearing 'Sonali Hen' under the poultry subsector, Credit Norms for rearing Buffalo and 'Garol Sheep' under the livestock subsector and reducing the interest rate of Agricultural Credit from 9 percent to maximum 8 percent.
Considering the demand of the farmers and actual scenario of farming activities in a particular area, per acre credit limit can be increased or decreased up to 15 percent from the mentioned credit norms in the Agricultural and Rural Credit Policy, the BB said.
It is mentionable here that Bangladesh Bank had created a refinance scheme of Taka 5000.00 crore from its own fund for working capital based agricultural sector to mitigate the crisis due to Covid-19 pandemic through a circular in 2020.
Under this scheme, the scheduled banks have disbursed Taka 4,295.14 crore. Besides this, the central bank issued a circular in 2020 to disburse agricultural credit to crops and grains sector at low cost to maintain the normalcy of supply and production of foods with the instruction of disbursing agricultural credit at 4 percent concessional interest rate. Under this scheme Taka 4,880.71 crore was disbursed up to June, 2021.
