Many farmers in eastern Uttar Pradesh received the first and second instalments of the PM-KISAN scheme in April. (Express photo by Vishal Srivastav)While farmers and farm leaders express concern over difficulties in accessing credit in the pre-sowing weeks, when agriculturists usually seek capital to make investments and purchase farm inputs, the state’s credit plan has set an agriculture sector lending target that is modestly more hopeful than the previous year. Officials say this is due to an apparent dip in demand for fresh credit.
While only 54 per cent of the target was achieved in 2018-19, the 2019-20 target for lending in agriculture has increased by 2.47 per cent from the previous year’s target. However, data shows that under the state’s annual credit plan, lending for the agriculture sector has dipped in comparison to 2016.
Disbursement by banks for the agriculture sector in 2016-17 was Rs 96,906 crore, showing year-on-year growth of 33 per cent. This fell to 48,857 in 2017-18, a negative year-on-year growth rate of minus 50 per cent. In 2018-19, while the state set a target of Rs 85,464 crore for agriculture sector lending, actual disbursals were Rs 67,914 crore, or 79 per cent of the target, despite a year-on-year growth of 39 per cent.
Of these disbursals, crop loans in 2016-17 were Rs 42,173 crore, a three per cent growth rate over the previous year. In 2017-18, crop loans totalled 25,322 crore, a a 40 per cent dip from the previous year. In 2018-19, while the target for crop loans was Rs 58,324 crore, actual crop loans disbursed totalled Rs 31,327 crore, 54 per cent of the target despite a 23 per cent rise since the previous year. Commercial banks were found to have lagged behind targets the most.
That achievement of the target rose from 47 per cent in 2017-18 to 54 per cent in 2018-19 is seen as a small positive sign that disbursements are picking up, officials said. The causes for non-achievement of targets for consecutive years is widely accepted to be the severe drought of 2018-19.
Among the steps being undertaken in the coming weeks are extension of Kisan Credit Cards to farmers engaged in fisheries or animal husbandry, reaching uncovered eligible farmers or arranging credit camps.
