CBN To Provide Farmers With N432bn For Wet Planting Season

The Central Bank of Nigeria has unveiled plans to release a framework for the integration of non-interest window in all its intervention programmes.

The intervention programmes that would mostly benefit from the non-interest funding window are the Anchor Borrowers’ Programme and the Targeted Credit Facility to support households and Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises affected by the COVID-19 pandemic .

The Bank also plans to fund the value chains of nine commodities to the tune of N432bn in the 2020 wet season.

The nine commodities are part of the ten focal commodities currently being promoted by the apex bank.

The commodities are rice, cotton, oil palm, tomato, cassava, poultry, fish, maize, cocoa and livestock/dairy.

These were disclosed by the apex bank’s Director, Corporate Communications, Isaac Okorafor and who represented the CBN Governor, Mr. Godwin Emefiele, at a stakeholder meeting on Thursday.

The Director, Development Finance Department, Yila Yusuf, was also was also at the meeting which was done to review the successes recorded under the ABP and the strategies for the 2020 agricultural wet season.

Also in attendance are the Presidents of the Rice Farmers Association of Nigeria, Alhaji Aminu Goronyo; National Cotton Association of Nigeria, Mr. Anibe Achimugu; Maize Association of Nigeria; Maize Association of Nigeria,Alhaji Bello Abubakar; and the Maize Growers, Processors, and Marketers Association of Nigeria, Dr. Edwin Uche

Okorafor said the creation of a non-interest window followed appeals by concerned stakeholders for farmers across the country who had raised concerns that they should also be considered for funding under the non-interest window.

While revealing that work had been concluded on the funding document, he said the policy would be issued shortly outlining how farmers under the category could apply and benefit from the agricultural programmes of the CBN.

Okorafor said the CBN in the 2020 agricultural wet season, was committed to aggressively fund its agricultural programmes and spur farmers along the value chains of selected crops.

This, he stated, would help to prevent the country from sliding int recession.

Speaking on the Targeted Credit Facility of the CBN aimed at alleviating the impact of the corona virus pandemic on individuals and small businesses, Okorafor noted that the apex bank was determined to stimulate the economy to ensure Nigeria does not experience consecutive quarters of negative growth.

Accordingly, he said that the CBN Governor, had directed the Development Finance Department of the Bank as well as the NIRSAL Micro-Finance Bank to fast-track the approval process of loans.

This, he noted, would help restore businesses and livelihoods to the path of sustainable growth.

In his remarks, Yusuf said the target for the 2020 agricultural wet season was to advance about N432bn, through the participating banks, in the value chains of nine commodities.

He also disclosed that over 1.1 million farmers, cultivating over one million hectares of farmland, were expected to benefit from the loans that will help to produce a collective output of 8.3 million metric tons.

According to Yusuf, the focus for the 2020 wet season is to ensure the provision of improved seeds to incentivize the farmers to return to their farms.

He also stressed that the CBN adopted the value chain approach across all the commodities to ensure that every player along the entire value chain, from the farmers through to the processors, was financed.

He said the Bank’s funding of the Anchor Borrowers’ Programme for the 2020 planting season was the highest since the inception of the programme in 2015.

He added that the N432bn funding was quite significant considering the successes recorded in the 2019 season that contributed to shielding Nigeria from any food shortage, particularly rice, in the heat of the global lockdown.

During the global lockdown, some major producing countries of staples, such as rice, closed their silos and halted the export of these produce from the shores of their respective countries.

Representatives of the various farmers’ association said the programme had enhanced the value chains of their respective commodities.

While pledging their support to the continued implementation of the Anchor Borrowers’ Programme to generate employment and create wealth, the Association Presidents also promised to ensure that the loans collected by farmers were promptly recovered in order to sustain the programme.