The Central Bank of Nigeria announced banks guaranteed 28,830 loans valued at N3.6 billion to farmers. This is under its Agricultural Credit Guarantee Scheme Fund (ACGSF) from January to October 2020.
The CBN said the loan values had grown in the past 10 months to 26,830 loans worth N3.6 billion. The loans in the ACGSF from January to October were :
- 1,923 loans worth N572.3 million guaranteed for livestock farmers.
- 531 loans worth N135.5 million for fishery.
- 5,925 loans worth N541.6 million guaranteed for mixed farming.
- 16,976 loans worth N1.9 billion for food crops farming.
- 1,942 loans worth N345.5 million for cash crops farming, while
- 333 loans worth N69.9 million guaranteed for other types of farming.
Decree No. established the Agricultural Credit Guarantee Scheme Fund (ACGSF) 20 of 1977 and begun business in April 1978. Its original share capital and paid-up capital were N100 million and N85.6 million respectively. The Federal Government holds 60% and the Central Bank of Nigeria holds 40% of the shares.
They increased the Capital base of the scheme to N3billion in March 2001. The fund guarantees credit facilities extended to farmers by banks. Which to 75% of the amount in default net of any security realized. The distribution of loans under the ACGSF declined by 31.62% in 2 years, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS). The NBS report showed that fund distribution under ACGSF declined by approximately 31.62%. Which is from N11.90 million allotted in 2017 to N8.14 million in 2019.
-Nairametrics.