The National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (Nabard) is bullish on its sponsorship route to help rural artisans and entrepreneurs showcase their products.
The bank under its Rural Innovation Fund (RIF) has made allocations for sponsoring artisans, entrepreneurs and skilled work of the rural people at various fairs, seminars and other mass gatherings.
The fund was constituted by merging the erstwhile Rural Promotion Corpus Fund (RPCS) and the Credit and Financial Services Fund (CFSF). With an initial corpus of Rs 140 crore, the fund had been designed to support innovative, risky and unconventional experiments in the firm, non-firm and micro-finance sectors.
The actual expenditure for last year by way of grants only in Uttar Pradesh was Rs 140.25 lakh, whereas the budget scheduled for this year is Rs 326.70 lakh.
Of this fund, the bank is scheduled to spend about Rs 8 lakh for fairs this year alone. The bank has already exhausted this amount at the ongoing Lucknow Mahotsav by sponsoring 30 stalls which were allotted to rural artisans and entrepreneurs. It also organised a handicraft exhibition at these stalls. Artisans from different parts of Uttar Pradesh and other states like Bihar, West Bengal, Orissa and Rajasthan have taken part in it.
Under its present sponsorship regime, the bank acquires stalls from the concerned authorities organising the fair and then make them available to the artisans. It also provides meals and other basic facilities to these artisans.
Nabard imparts training, support and assistance to rural people to learn skills and help them find employment for themselves. This is done by supporting a group of people popularly known as the self-help group (SHGs).
At present the bank covers about 70 districts in the state through their district development officers, who in turn help nurture these groups.
“Quality is the main component of the products made by these artisans but lack of proper packaging and almost complete absence of marketing of these products results in meager income for them,” said Rakesh Bahadur, assistant general manager, Nabard (Lucknow branch).
Further, the bank is contemplating on acquiring space in up-market shopping centres and showcase these handicraft items for sale.
It is expected to provide visibility to these products and in addition will also fetch better prices.
