Farm credit disbursement set to beat target this fiscal
Siddique Islam
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June 22, 2016 00:00:00
The target of farm credit disbursement is expected to be crossed by the end of the current fiscal year (FY) as the central bank has beefed up efforts to make such credit available for farmers, officials said.
The expectation came after attainment of more than 94 per cent of the annual agriculture loan disbursement target of Tk 164 billion by the banks in 11 months to up to June of the outgoing FY 2015-16.
"We expect the agriculture loan disbursement target to be exceeded by the end of the FY 16," Shubhankar Saha, spokesperson of the Bangladesh Bank (BB) told the FE Tuesday.
All banks would be achieving 105 per cent of their annual agriculture loan disbursement target by the end of June finally, Mr. Saha, also executive director of the central bank, projected.
"We crossed the farm credit disbursement targets in the last three consecutive years," the spokesperson noted.
Meanwhile, farm credit disbursement grew by nearly 13 per cent in the 11 months of the FY '16 following continuous persuasion of the bankers by the central bank.
Disbursement of farm credit rose to Tk 154.41 billion in the July-May period of the FY '16 from Tk 136.98 billion in the same period of the previous fiscal, according to the central bank latest statistics.
Of Tk 154.41 billion, eight state-owned banks disbursed Tk 77.52 billion, and the remaining Tk 76.89 billion was disbursed by private commercial banks (PCBs) and foreign commercial banks (FCBs).
The recovery of farm loans, however, rose to Tk 153.07 billion during the period under the review from Tk 137.82 billion in the same period of the previous fiscal, the BB data showed.
