Provinces urged to issue farmer passbooks
KARACHI - Governor State Bank of Pakistan Dr Shamshad Akhtar on Tuesday urged the provincial governments to ensure speedy issuance of passbooks to the farmers in order to enable them to get bank credit.Passbook is a basic provincial document containing details of agriculture land and ownership. Banks treat this document essential for determining the eligibility of farmers for getting credit.
Two years ago, the former governor of the SBP had written a letter to the chief secretary of Sindh to overhaul the system, but so far the Sindh government has failed to take corrective measures with the result that the farmers in the absence of passbooks are being denied agriculture credit.
Chairing the mid-term meeting of the Agriculture Credit Advisory Committee (ACAC) held at the central building of the central bank, Shamshad suggested that the SBP, in collaboration with the Ministry of Food and Agriculture and other stakeholders, should develop a strategy for improving the current agriculture credit situation.
She also suggested that the opportunities of overall absorption of credit across the country through corporate farming should be availed on a large-scale for the benefit of all stakeholders. The governor, while expressing dissatisfaction over the slower growth in disbursement of credit to the agriculture sector, urged the banks to take necessary steps to accelerate the pace of credit disbursement during the coming months so that full year target of Rs160 billion could be achieved.
She also expressed concern over the dismal performance of some banks in agriculture credit disbursement. She asked the heads of the banks to submit their action plan to the SBP to overcome the shortfall and meet their annual disbursement targets.
Source: The News-International