2024-08-30 02:28:22
Published: 21:20, 29 August 2024
To increase agricultural production, the commercial banks have fixed the allocation of 38 thousand crore rupees for the farmers in the current financial year 2024-25. This number is 8.57 percent more than the target set for the fiscal year. Last financial year, the agricultural loan target was set at 35 thousand crores.
On Thursday (August 29) the policy and program of agricultural and rural credit for the new fiscal year was officially announced by the Governor of the Central Bank. Ahsan H. Mansoor. The chief executives and managing directors of various commercial banks along with the director of the agricultural credit department were present at this time.
This time, the government-owned commercial and specialized banks are setting a target of Tk 12,615 crore, and Tk 25,385 crore for private and foreign commercial banks. Banks will be able to use their own networks (branches, sub-branches, agent banking, contract farming, syndicated loan disbursement) and bank-MFI linkages to achieve their credit disbursement targets. In this case, the loan amount distributed through the bank’s own network cannot be less than 50 percent. This time, 60 percent of the total target should be distributed to the crops and crops sector, 13 percent to the fisheries sector and 15 percent to the livestock sector.
Bangladesh Bank has set up a fund called ‘Bangladesh Bank Agricultural Development Common Fund (BBADCF)’ to invest the unearned portion of the banks’ agricultural and rural credit distribution targets in the agricultural sector. The unearned portion of the banks that failed to achieve the target should be deposited in this fund. They will be given interest at the rate of 2 percent against this deposit. The money deposited in this common fund will be disbursed at the customer level under the Agricultural and Rural Credit Policy through banks that achieve the target.
It is known that against the target of 35 thousand crores set in the last financial year, the banks have distributed 37 thousand 154 crores of agricultural and rural loans, which is 106.15 percent of the total target. 32 thousand 830 crore was distributed in the previous financial year.
NF/NH