ISLAMABAD: Minister for Privatisation Daniyal Aziz stressed the need for revisiting the Loans for Agriculture, Commercial and Industrial Purposes Act 1973, which was restricted to only agriculture loaning.
Chairing a meeting, the minister noted during the meeting that the deposit base of the banks was fast growing whereas lending was restricted to agriculture loaning. The minister called for enhancing banking sector’s outreach in the rural areas of the country in order to ensure easy access to credit facility for the people living in underprivileged and far flung areas of the country.
The minister also asked for extending the credit outreach facility for other sectors and it should not be merely restricted to agriculture or farming.
It may be recalled that the cabinet has formed an inter-ministerial committee headed by Minister for Privatisation to propose amendments in the above mentioned act.
The Minister asked the financial institutions for extending their credit facilities to allied industries for a balanced economic growth and development in the country. The Federal Minister suggested the banks to consider the provision of credit on basis of disposable income instead of using typical methodology.
Meanwhile, the representative of the NBP informed that the total agriculture loan portfolio stood at Rs50 billion, whereas it was providing credit facilities to about 260,000 farmers across the country.
The representative of HBL said that HBL lend 34 billion rupees to farmers under its agriculture loan program at 11 per cent interest rate. Senior officials from SBP, National Bank, ZTBL, Ministry of Finance and HBL attended the meeting.
