The National Bank for Agricultural and Rural Development (NABARD) and the State Bank of India have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) aimed at mutual collaboration in their mission to impove rural prosperity through convergence of their institutional lending and ongoing developmental initiatives.
The MOU was executed by NABARD Chief General Manager Sudhir Kumar Jannawar and SBI Amaravati Local Head Office Chief General Manager Sanjay Sahay in the presence of NABARD Chairman Govinda Rajulu Chintala, on Monday.
Mr. Chintala said that agriculture had always been the silver lining in the current pandemic time. To supplement the efforts of the Union Government under ‘Atma Nirbhar’ package, especially in the agricultural and rural development sector and to ensure uninterrupted and adequate credit flow to the sector, the NABARD has announced a number of special concessional refinance products for credit to watershed / tribal areas, micro-food processing entreprises, water, sanitation and health (WASH) and creation of infrastructure by PACS under Agricultural Infrastructure Fund.
Skill development
The bank has also redesigned a number of its developmental programmes aimed at skilling and providing entrepreneurial skills among the rural youth especially, the reverse migrants. He said that such collaboration between NABARD and the banks would not only benefit the various stakeholders of rural Andhra Pradesh but also ensure effective convergence of the efforts of the individual institutions.
Mr. Sudhir Kumar Jannawar said that during the last five years, 293 Farmer Producers Organisations (FPO) had been promoted and nurtured in the State, covering more than 1 lakh farmer shareholders.
Processing infrastructure
With the active collaboration between the two entities, the FPOs would be able to access bank credit for their business initiatives including setting up of storage and primary processing infrastructure.
Mr. Sanjay Sahay said this joint initiative of teh NABARAD and the SBI would give a fillip to the lending by the SBI in the State especially in areas wherein NABARD has already areas.
