Press Information Bureau

Government of India

Ministry of Finance

09-August-2012 17:56 IST

Rs. 4,72,894 Crore Outstanding Farm Loans by PSBs

The credit outstanding of Public Sector Banks to agriculture sector was Rs. 419,346 crore in March 2011 and Rs. 472,894 crore in March 2012.

The Agricultural Debt Waiver and Debt Relief Scheme (ADWDRS), 2008 has de-clogged the lines of credit that were clogged due to the debt burden on the farmers. Under the scheme Rs. 52,275.55 crore has been released by the Government to RBI and NABARD to give benefit to 3.45 crore farmers.

In order to increase the institutional credit to farmers on affordable terms, the Interest Subvention Scheme is being implemented by the Government of India since 2006-07 to make short-term crop loans upto Rs. 3 lakh for a period of one year available to farmers at the interest rate of 7% per annum. The Government of India has since 2009-10 been providing additional interest subvention to farmers those who repay their loan in time. The additional subvention was 1% in 2009-10 and 2% in 2010-11. This has been increased to 3% in 2011-12. Further in order to discourage distress sales, the benefit of interest subvention was made available in the year 2011-12 to small and marginal farmers having Kisan Credit Card for a further period of upto six months post harvest on the same rates as available to crop loans against Negotiable warehouse receipts for keeping their produce in warehouses. The Government in the Budget Speech of 2012-13 announced continuation of the Scheme in 2012-13 as well.

As per the report on the “Indebtedness of Farmer Households” released by National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) in May 2005, of the 89.35 million farmer households, 43.42 million farmer households (48.6%) were reported to be indebted to either formal or informal or both sources of credit. There is no report available with the Department of Agriculture and Cooperation to indicate as to whether there has been unexpected rise in the indebtedness of the farmers.

This was stated by the Minister of State for Finance, Shri Namo Narain Meena in written reply to a question in the Rajya Sabha today.

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DSM/RS/bs

Interest Subvention Scheme expands subsidised short term crop credit and adds timely repayment incentives for farmers. The Agricultural Debt Waiver and Debt Relief Scheme, 2008 cleared blocked credit by providing funds via Government transfers to RBI and NABARD, while the Interest Subvention Scheme subsidises one year short term crop loans and offers additional subvention for timely repayment, extended to small and marginal farmers post harvest against Negotiable Warehouse Receipts; continuation of the scheme was announced and NSSO 2005 data showed substantial farmer indebtedness without evidence of an unexpected rise.