DHAKA, April 25, 2021 (BSS) – Bangladesh Krishi Bank (BKB) has ensured cent percent disbursement of loans under the stimulus packages meant for the farmers and small entrepreneurs who have been affected due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
After completing the stipulated disbursement of loans in the first phase, the state run Bank has also ensured afresh cent percent disbursement of loans in the 2nd phase.
The government in April last year formed a Taka 20,000 crore fund to provide stimulus to the affected cottage, micro, small and medium enterprises so that they can recoup their losses from this deadly virus.
Besides, a Taka 8,000 crore fund was also formed for the agriculture sector including a Taka 5,000 crore fund for the non-crop agriculture and Taka 3,000 crore fund for the marginal farmers and low-income professionals.
The Bangladesh Bank had earlier set a ceiling of Taka 1,199 crore to be disbursed among the affected farmers by the BKB due to COVID-19 in the first phase. After disbursing that amount in full length, the BKB sought additional amount afresh from the central bank to disburse that among the affected farmers. After receiving that additional amount of Taka 500 crore, the BKB has also completed disbursement of that amount in this month.
According to official data, the Krishi Bank has disbursed a total amount of Taka 1,699 crore as loans under the stimulus package meant for the affected farmers from April 2020 to April 2021.
Apart from this, the Bank has so far released Taka 354 crore in three tranches in the CSME sector.
Talking to BSS, managing director of BKB Md Ali Hossain Prodhania said that as fast as loans could be disbursed, the rural economy and the affected people would be able to rebound in such pace.
“From such perception, the BKB has been disbursing loans in a very planned way from the announcement of the stimulus packages. The Bank has ensured the disbursement of the fresh limit after completing disbursement of loans under stimulus package in the first phase,” he said.
He also said that the amount received from the central bank was divided among all the branches so that no branch lag behind adding, “For this, our strategy was to make regular monitoring and we’ve also got good results from that initiative,”
Ali Hossain said a software was also launched to make regular monitoring of loan disbursement.
The BKB managing director said out of the total recipients of the stimulus loans, 15 percent were regular clients while the rest of 85 percent received loans from this bank for the first time.
He opined that the loans distributed under the stimulus packages have played an important role before the bumper production of Boro Crops this year.
It is notable that about 60 percent of the loans under the stimulus packages for the agriculture and CSME sector to recoup their losses from the COVID-19 could not be disbursed so far. For this, the central bank has extended the timeframe for disbursement of such loans for the 6th time till June this year.