The National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (Nabard) has recorded a 40 per cent growth in agriculture credit and rural development in Karnataka during 2011-12. It has extended farm credit of Rs 6,053 crore during the year. While the production credit refinance extended to cooperative banks and regional rural banks (RRBs) was Rs 3,775 crore, its finance to state government under the Rural Infrastructure Development Fund (RIDF) was Rs 739 crore. This would ensure rural connectivity, irrigation and rural social sector investments.
“In order to augment capital formation in agriculture an all-time high investment refinance of Rs 1,345 crore has been disbursed to various banks in the state, recording a 37 per cent growth over the previous year,” S N A Jinnah, chief general manager, Nabard, Karnataka, said.
During the year, Nabard introduced Nabard Infras-tructure Development Assi-stance (NIDA) under which Rs 42 crore was sanctioned to the Karnataka State Warehousing Corporation (KSWC) for construction of godowns and Rs 244 crore to Krishna Bhagya Jala Nigam for lift irrigation schemes, he told reporters.
Explaining the achievements of Karnataka region, Jinnah said it assisted 118 villages under the Village Development Programme during the year.
For the development of Rural Non-Farm Sector, apart from providing refinance support to the banks, Nabard supported 249 entrepreneurship / skill development programmes, most of them through RUDSETIs and RSETIs. Rural artisans and SHG members were supported to participate in 21 marketing events, he said.
Institutional Development of Cooperative Banks and RRBs is another priority sector for Nabard. Under the Revival Package for Short Term Cooperative Credit Structure, recapitalisation assistance of Rs 643 crore has been provided to the PACS. Over 22,000 field functionaries of cooperatives have been provided training. Government of Karnataka, has implemented legal and institutional reforms to enable the cooperatives to function as a member-driven, democratic and viable institutions. Common Accounting System has been introduced in the PACS, he added.
With the facilitation of Nabard, Kolar DCCB also qua-lified for licensing by March 2012. Nabard also facilitated installation of core bank-ing solutions in seven DCCBs with the Apex Bank expected to join the project soon. All cooperative banks are expected to be CBS-compliant by March, 2013.
Nabard’s regional office intends to move closer to Suvarna Karnataka through focus on improving income levels of farmers, promoting dryland horticulture, full coverage of farmers through KCC and conversion of KCC to smart cards, improving per group credit for SHGs and new initiatives in NFS including implementation of the handloom package.
