Tanzania’s National Bank of Commerce (NBC) has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Kanu Equipment Tanzania, a firm selling agricultural equipment aimed at boosting farmers’ production.
The signed pact also means that farmers will now be provided with loans to enable them to purchase agricultural inputs to increase efficiency and productivity. The loans which will be offered at an interest rate of 10% and below, are expected to greatly boost the agriculture sector in the country.
The bank’s business division director Elvis Nduguru said at the signing ceremony in Dar es Salaam that under the pact, buyers of agricultural inputs across the country will be able to get cheap and quick loans to buy equipment like tractors from Kanu company within 14 days.
“We have seen it good to support the efforts of government by collaborating with Kanu and other partners to provide cheap loans to increase efficiency in the agriculture sector. We, at the NBC Bank, being the biggest stakeholder in the sector in the country, appreciate and recognise the contribution of agriculture to the national economy,” said Mr Nduguru.
Agriculture sector
The agriculture sector contributes more than 65% of the total country’s production, while employing at least 75% of the population. The bank’s agriculture division head Raymond Urassa said the pact that they entered yesterday will enable farmers and traders in the agriculture value chain not only to get agricultural tools and inputs at low cost, but also get them at the right time.
“Our goal is to ensure that farmers get agriculture equipment within a short period of time while at the same time having a friendly time for loan repayment according to crop growing season,” he recounted.
Kanu Equipment representative Edson Nalogwa commended the bank’s support saying the loans were friendly and had favourable conditions. “The conditions for the instrument used to guarantee loans to farmers were also very favourable,” he said.
NBC Bank is a major agricultural stakeholder in the country, providing many loans to farmers and the entire value chain. Recently, the government had set out a ‘10/30 agenda’ that seek to increase agriculture output from the current 5 to 10% by 2030.
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