CBN Gov Advocates Agric Farming For 2016

The Governor of
the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Mr Godwin Emefiele has said that 2016 would see the financial industry raise support and increase its contributions in the development of the nation’s agricultural sector to reduce importation and foreign exchange spending on food products.
Emefiele who was speaking in Abuja at the yearly Banker’s Committee retreat added that there would also be support for Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs).
He revealed that the new initiative involves N300 billion for agriculture financing.
The new N300 billion initiative would be a combination of CBN’s intervention and banks liquidity which was recently boosted with the reduction in cash reserve requirements from 25 per cent to 20 per cent.
Emefiehe who is also the chairman of the Bankers Committee explained that previous efforts of the committee to spotlight opportunities and toe support agriculture in the country resulted to improved lending by banks to manufacturing power and aviation with notable shift from one per cent in 2010 to four  per cent in 2015 in agriculture.
He however noted that there was need to de-risk the agriculture value chains to enable banks voluntarily open up their vaults in support of the sector’s development.
“The committee feels there is need for monetary and fiscal authorities to work together in a collaborative manner to achieve the objective of improving the local production of specific agricultural products like rice, tomatoes, beans,fish and sugar amongst others” he said.
According to the CBN boss, there was also need to improve the level of infrastructure in various sectors, build more ADAMA roads, provide power and build more silos to preserve agricultural products right at the farms.
He further said banks would give all their support in financing these growth requirements.