PASS issues 90bn/- agro loan in three months

The trust’s latest released report shows that the organisation approved agricultural projects valued at over 92bn/-, which is 88 per cent of the target of about 105bn/- over the period. But, the trust surpassed by far the target of preparing 372 business plans, writing 1,973 plans instead, the 530 per cent achievement.

“We have had an impressive year (2017) and we look forward to surpass our annual operational targets by the year end,” PASS Managing Director Nicomed Bohay said in Dar es Salaam, yesterday.

He credited the success to the organisation’s intensified efforts to expand outreach to ensure more peasants, especially in rural areas, have access to affordable and reliable financing. In the past nine-month period, PASS had Arusha, Mbeya, Morogoro and Mtwara as the top four loan recipients, with 35bn/-, 22bn/-, 18bn/- and 11bn/-, respectively.

In Mtwara 1,650 business plans were written mostly for the cashew nuts growers. The target, however, was to guarantee 15.3bn/- loans to the cashew producers in the region. The funded projects, Mr Bohay said, created 19,484 jobs for mostly Tanzanians, with crop production’s 19,366 opportunities topping the list.

Other sectors with their number of jobs in brackets are crop trading (69), mechanisation (18) and livestock (14), agro-processing (11) and input trading (six).

“We look forward to work more closely with our partner commercial banks to help all community banks in the country to access affordable credits for investments in farming activities,” said Mr Bohay, expressing hopes on better performance in the final quarter.

PASS has just signed a 20 million US dollar (about 45bn/-) Guarantee Agreement with the Swedish government through SIDA, attracting commercial banks to increase funding to agriculture. The National Microfinance Bank (NMB) and CRDB Bank

SOURCE: DAILY NEWS

• 745