BB finances likely to jack up milk output

The Bangladesh Bank looks to launch a refinance scheme worth Tk 2.0 billion to help narrow the gap between demand and production of milk, officials said.
The move has been taken to widen loan facility to milk and milk food processing projects, farmers and individuals to make the country self-sufficient in milk production, they said.
In recent years, the demand for milk has increased sharply prompting a large number of farmers to set up farms for producing milk. These farmers need working capital to establish more farms to meet local demand for milk, the officials added.
The board of directors of the central bank in a recent meeting has taken the decision in principle to launch the scheme, they said.
The rate of interest on the scheme's loan is 5 per cent which will be provided by its clients. The government will provide the banks concerned with 5 per cent as interest subsidy.
The tenure of the refinance scheme will be five years. The central bank will run the refinance scheme through scheduled banks, a central banker said.
Secretary of the Bank and Financial Institutions Division (BFID) M Aslam Alam has sent a summary to Finance Minister AMA Muhith for no-objection to interest subsidy.
Later, the finance minister has asked the BFID to send the proposal to finance division for scrutiny. The division has already sent the proposal, seeking approval for 5 per cent interest subsidy.
Meanwhile, the BB has sanctioned refinance worth Tk 1.0 billion to Ansar-VDP Unnayan Bank and Karma Sangsthan Bank each for disbursing loans to shrimp, fish, milk and livestock sectors, according to the BFID data.
Under its refinance scheme, the central bank has also provided some Tk 5.0 billion and Tk 2.0 billion to Bangladesh Krishi Bank (BKB) and Rajshahi Krishi Unnayan Bank (RAKUB) respectively for crop, fish and livestock sectors in the current fiscal year, the data showed.
A JICA fund worth Tk 6.50 billion is now in BB's hand. The activity of the funds is likely to be introduced for livestock sector soon. The country's scheduled banks disbursed Tk 10.10 billion to livestock sector from July to December in the current fiscal year, the data mentioned.
Country's total cattle population was 33.3 million while milk production was 0.94 million tonnes and meat production was around 0.67 million tonnes in 1990.
In 2014, the cattle population reached 53.6 million while milk production stood at 6.09 million tonnes and meat production jumped to 4.52 million tonnes. Still, the country has a big shortage of milk and meat.
The annual milk deficiency is around 7.93 million tonnes against the total demand of 14.02 million tonnes. Country's annual meat deficiency is around 2.21 million tonnes against the demand of 6.73 tonnes.
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