National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) announced a refinance scheme which offers an incentive to the banks to give loans for setting up warehouses for agricultural commodities.
“Under the scheme, NABARD will extend financial assistance by way of refinance to banks against the loans disbursed by them for construction of warehouse infrastructure for the agricultural commodities,” NABARD Ahmedabad CGM, H R Dave, said.
“NABARD will charge interest of 8 per cent p.a., while interest rate on loans to the borrowers would be decided by the banks,” he said, speaking at a gathering of bankers.
“We will also extend an interest rebate of 1.5 per cent to borrowers who repay loans on schedule,” Dave said.
The scheme has been conceptualised out of a Rs 2,000 cr dedicated fund in the Union Budget 2011-12.
Authorities hope it will help create 9 million tonnes of additional storage capacity for the agricultural produce.
The scheme is open to all kinds of banks.
As per the recently announced central scheme, all Kisan Credit Card holding farmers can now avail loans at 7 per cent interest rate for maximum six months for storage of produce post-harvest.
Mr. Dave stressed the need for good warehouses to meet the requirements of the growing agriculture sector. He put a special emphasis on the need to encourage accredited warehouses - as stipulated by the Warehousing Development Regulatory Authority (WDRA) - so as to make farmers eligible for benefits of the loan scheme.
