The Central Bank of Nigeria has disbursed under the Anchor Borrowers’ Programme (ABP), N927.94 billion to over 4.5 million smallholder farmers, who are cultivating 21 commodities across the country.
This was disclosed in the Central Bank of Nigeria Communiqué No. 140 of the Monetary Policy Committee meeting held on Monday 24th and Tuesday 25th January 2022.
The Bank’s intervention programs focused on boosting productivity in manufacturing/industries, agriculture, energy/infrastructure, healthcare, and Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) were evaluated by the Committee.
What the report is saying about the Anchor Borrowers’ Programme
The small uptick in headline inflation (year-on-year) to 15.63% in December 2021 from 15.40% in November, following seven months of reduction, was noted with concern by the Committee.
Both the diet and the basic components were blamed for the unanticipated growth. The CBN, on the other hand, argued that food market intervention will finally bring inflation down.
The Central Bank of Nigeria highlighted the amount of intervention for the tail end of the year 2021, and the cumulative disbursements to beneficiaries.
The CBN said, ”Between November and December 2021, under the Anchor Borrowers’ Programme (ABP), the Bank disbursed N75.99 billion to support the cultivation of over 383,000 hectares of maize, rice and wheat during the 2022 dry season, bringing the cumulative disbursements under the Programme to N927.94 billion to over 4.5 million smallholder farmers cultivating 21 commodities across the country.“
The apex bank also disbursed funds under the Commercial Agriculture Credit Scheme. The CBN said, “The Bank also released N1.76 billion to finance two (2) large-scale agricultural projects under the Commercial Agriculture Credit Scheme (CACS).”
The central bank also stated that all excess output aggregated from the financed farmers will be released to the Nigeria Commodity Exchange (NCX) to help moderate the prices of food in the market.
What you should know about the Anchor Borrowers’ Programme
- In November 2015, President Muhammadu Buhari launched the ABP initiative to boost agricultural production, improve foreign exchange and reverse Nigeria’s negative balance of trade on food.
- Smallholder farmers cultivating cereals (rice, maize, wheat etc.) cotton, roots and tubers, sugarcane, tree crops, legumes, tomato and livestock are those captured under this initiative.
- Loans are disbursed to the beneficiary farmers through Deposit Money Banks (DMBs), Development Finance Institutions (DFIs) and Microfinance Banks (MFBs), which the programme recognises as Participating Financial Institutions (PFIs).
