Ecobank Nigeria has restated its commitment to the agricultural sector and is supporting over 70,000 farmers with special loans to increase their capacity and yields during this planting season.
This is one of the bank’s initiatives to promote entrepreneurship in the sector and is in support of the Central Bank of Nigeria’s Anchor Borrowers programmes for the 2020 wet season with the Maize Growers, Processors and Marketers Association of Nigeria (MAGPAMAN).
Head, Agribusiness, Ecobank Nigeria, Mojisola Oguntoyinbo, announced this in Lagos while responding to media enquiries on the participation of the bank in the CBN scheme.
According to her, the initiative spreads across the 36 states and is one of the several concerted efforts on the part of the bank to support the government to create an ecosystem that gives smallholder farmers access to funding and the required support to increase food production in the country.
She noted that the scheme is designed to connect smallholder farmers with processors and off-takers within the agriculture value chain.
“We are creating opportunities in the agric sector that will help many smallholder farmers expand their business and become worthy employers of labour by adopting modern farming techniques for the betterment of our economy.
We are in strategic partnership with NIRSAL and some other developmental institutions to achieve our purpose. We are also partnering the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) in all its intervention schemes and program aimed at developing the sector.
Our relationships are generating positive activities across the entire agric value chain,” she said.
Ecobank has been actively leveraging entrepreneurship as a strategy to tackle poverty and growing unemployment, through the creation of relevant platforms.
One of such platforms is the Ecobank Xpress Point, the bank’s agency banking proposition which enables agents to carry out financial transactions on behalf of Ecobank and earn commission on transactions processed.