Farmers in India require mainly medium term and long term loans and they face a lot of difficulties in getting them. The only organization providing long term credit is Land Development Banks which have lagged behind and recorded only limited success. The credit requirements of the agricultural sector are increasing year after year. With the aim of bridging the gap in agricultural finance and to extend credit for projects involving agricultural development, an organization called the Agricultural Refinance Development Corporation (ARDC) was established by an Act of Parliament and it started functioning from July 1, 1963.
Objectives of the ARDC:
(i) To provide necessary funds by way of refinance to eligible institutions such as the Central Land Development Banks, State Co-operative Banks, and Scheduled banks.
floated by the Central Land Development banks, State Co-operative Banks, and Scheduled banks, provided they were approved by the RBI.
Regional Rural Banks (RRBs)
One of the important points of the 20 points economic programme of Mrs. Indira Gandhi during emergency was the liquidation of rural indebtedness by stages and provide institutional credit to farmers and artisans in rural areas. It was in pursuance of this aspect of the New Economic programme that the Government of India setup Regional Rural Banks (RRBs) on 1975.
The share capital of RRB is subscribed by the Central Government (50%), the State Government concerned (15%), and the sponsoring commercial bank (35%). The main objective of the RRBs is to provide credit and other facilities particularly to the small and marginal farmers, agricultural labourers, artisans and small entrepreneurs so as to develop agriculture, trade, commerce, industry and other productive activities in the rural areas.
Concessions to RRBs
From the beginning, the sponsor banks have continued to provide managerial and financial assistance to RRBs and also other concessions such as lower rate of interest (8.5 per cent) on the latter’s borrowings from sponsor banks. Further, the cost of staff deputed to RRBs.
and training expenses of RRB staff are borne by the sponsor banks.
The RBI has been granting many concessions to RRBs:
(a) They are allowed to maintain cash reserve ratio at 3 per cent and statutory liquidity ratio at 25 per cent; and
(b) They also provide refinance facilities through NABARD.
NABARD and its role in Agricultural credit
Since its inception, RBI has shown keen interest in agricultural credit and maintained a separate department for this purpose. RBI extended short-term seasonal credit as well as medium-term and long-term credit to agriculture through State level co-operative banks and Land Development banks.
At the same time, RBI has also set up the Agricultural Refinance Development Corporation (ARDC) to provide refinance support to the banks to promote programmes of agricultural development, particularly those requiring term credit. With the widening of the role of bank credit from “agricultural development” to “rural development” the Government proposed to have a more broad-based organization at the apex level to extend support and give guidance to credit institutions in matters relating to the formulation and implementation of rural development programmes.
A National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD), was therefore, set up in July 1982 by an Act of parliament to take over the functions of ARDC and the refinancing functions of RBI in relation to co-operative banks and RRBs. NABARD is linked organically with the RBI by the latter contributing half of its share capital the other half being contributed by the Government of India(GOI). GOI nominates three of its Central Board Directors on the board of NABARD.A Deputy Governor of RBI is appointed as Chairman of NABARD.
Functions of NABARD
NABARD has inherited its apex role from RBI i.e, it is performing all the Banking functions performed by RBI with regard to agricultural credit.
(i) NABARD acts as a refinancing institution for all kinds of production and investment credit to agriculture, small-scale industries, cottage and village industries, handicrafts and rural crafts and real artisans and other allied economic activities with a view to promoting integrated rural development.
(ii) It provides short-term, mediumterm and long-term credits to state co-operative Banks (SCBs), RRBs, LDBs and other financial institutions approved by RBI.
(iii) NABARD gives long-term loans (upto 20 Years) to State Government to enable them to subscribe to the share capital of co-operative credit societies.
(iv) NABARD gives long-term loans to any institution approved by the Central Government or contribute to the share capital or invests in securities of any institution concerned with agriculture and rural development.
(v) NABARD has the responsibility of co-ordinating the activities of Central and State Governments, the Planning Commission (now NITI Aayog) and other all India and State level institutions entrusted with the development of small scale industries, village and cottage industries, rural crafts, industries in the tiny and decentralized sectors, etc.
(vi) It has the responsibility to inspect RRBs and co-operative banks, other than primary co-operative societies.
(vii) It maintains a Research and Development Fund to promote research in agriculture and rural development
