Strong primary credit system may prop Centre's funding bodies
UNITED NEWS OF INDIA
BIDAR, January 4: Prime Minister I K Gujral on Sunday said a strong and sound primary credit structure would lend strength and stability to the central financing agency.Speaking at the diamond jubilee celebrations of the Bidar District Central Cooperative Bank here, he said the Central cooperative banks should play a pivotal role in this regard and should ensure that the benefits of the cooperative activities reach the weaker sections of society, including the scheduled castes and the scheduled tribes. "Our goal is not only to double the flow of credit for agriculture, but also to ensure that adequate credit flows to the less privileged classes like small and marginal farmers", he said. Gujral said it was a wrong notion that the small and marginal farmers could not be brought under the discipline of banking norms. If adequate and timely credit with necessary extension support was provided to them, they could become good customers of credit institutions.He said that apart from credit the farmers also
require guidance in planning their agricultural operations like use of seeds, fertilizers and pesticides, besides raising crops. Agricultural credit and agricultural improvement should go hand in hand and the farmers should be taught improved farming methods. Gujral said this task has to be performed at grassroot level institutions like cooperative societies/banks, commercial banks, regional rural banks (RRBs) with the financial support of National Bank for Agricultural and Rural Development (Nabard) and proper coordination from state governments. Gujral said the country would require about 235 million tonnes of foodgrains by 2000 to meet the domestic demand. For this purpose efforts should be made to increase productivity by efficiently utilising the existing land and water resources,besides adopting better cultivation methods and harnessing the vast potential of dryland farming. All these call for manifold increase in institutional credit flow both for investment and production purposes. There should be
substantial growth, especially in production credit, to sustain the over three per cent growth rate in agricultural production.
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
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