Bhubaneswar: The National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) on Tuesday released State Focus Paper for Odisha projecting an overall credit potential under priority sector at Rs.1,34,665 crore for the financial year 2022-23.
The NABARD has conducted the State Credit Seminar for 2022-23 here, which was inaugurated by Finance Minister Niranjan Pujari.
Development Commissioner PK Jena, Agriculture Production Commissioner (APC) Sanjeev Chopra, Principal Secretary, Finance, Vishal Kumar Dev, Fisheries and Animal Husbandry Secretary R Raghu Prasad, RBI Regional Director HN Panda, SLBC Convenor Arupananda Jena and heads of several banks and government departments attended the meeting.
Further, all the District Collectors, Lead District Managers and NABARD District Development Managers were connected virtually in the seminar.
The projected credit flow for the State of Odisha is 21.61% more than the credit projection of 2021-22. Out of the total credit potential for the priority sector, an amount of Rs. 52,050.78 crore has been assessed under agriculture. Emphasis has been given to recalibrate the potential assessment keeping in view the recent trends in achievement of ground level credit.
Mr.Pujari congratulated NABARD for completing the credit planning exercise and emphasized upon the need for increasing the bank credit for priority sector in Odisha as Government has been pushing lot of support through various schemes like Balaram, Kalia, Samrudhi, Millet Mission, FPOs etc and it’s time for Banks to increase the credit flow for private capital formation substantially.
Activities such as animal husbandry, poultry, fisheries etc., leading to asset formation and diversification of the income basket of farmers need to be credit linked, he said.
The State Government has been untiringly developing the enabling infrastructure in the State for the effective growth in agriculture sector and Banks have to push the credit for the economic benefits to percolate to the farmers, added the Minister.
Principal Secretary Finance Mr.Dev said that the credit flow from banks to the priority sector in Odisha needs a lot of urgent improvement and attention.
He said that the State economy could withstand the negative impact of Covid and proved its resilience. Dev indicated that a five year long term planning exercise has been commenced for a structured development of the state.
He called for removal of rural and urban disparity among the districts in terms of extending financial services and paving way for sustained development. He asked all banks to achieve the set targets and increase the bar.
Welcoming the dignitaries, CGM of NABARD C Udayabhaskar said that concerted efforts need to be made for achieving the set targets for the current year and increase the credit flow to priority sector.
He said that NABARD has been increasing their support for the infrastructure development, tribal development, watershed development and micro entrepreneur development among SHG women and will increase the developmental activities in the State.
Earlier in the meeting, SLBC Convenor Mr.Jena said that banks have to achieve the set target of Rs 1.10 lakh crore by the end of the current financial year and the current performance as at the end of September 2021 is not very encouraging.
RBI Regional Director Mr.Panda spoke about the historical reasons for the low bank credit in Odisha and asked Banks to be aspirational as Odisha is a growing and aspirational State and should be having the highest CD ratio in the eastern region of the country.
He said banks may support the IT sector to boost the credit flow and suggested that CD ratio need to be at least 75 per cent for all districts.
The Fisheries Secretary expressed happiness that banks have been very positive in providing credit to the allied sectors such as dairy, goatery, fisheries etc. He said that there is tremendous potential for inland fisheries in the State and banks have to aggressively push the credit flow to the allied sectors.
He also suggested that for the year 2022-23, the outlay for allied sector has been much more than the projection. Further, Prasad suggested that specific training in allied activities financing is essential for the young bank officers.
APC Sanjeev Chopra asked the bankers and line departments to introspect, revisit the strategies required for upscaling the credit flow and for removing the operational impediments in the growth of credit to the priority sector. BALARAM needs total relook and positive support from Banks, he said.
Development Commissioner Mr.Jena said that Odisha has been growing faster and better and Banks have to improve the quality of lending. He advised all district collectors who are Heads of DCC that all efforts have to be put to achieve the current year targets.
Mr.Jena said demand needs to be created at grass roots level and KCC needs to be broad based to support allied activities. He also said that start-ups also need credit and Banks have to come forward.
On this occasion, FPO Abhiyan for strengthening the FPOs, Sanitation Campaign Phase II for spreading the usage of toilets, building new toilets etc were launched apart from digital media tools on Financial Inclusion developed by NABARD.
