CBN disburses N927.94bn to over 4.5m smallholder farmers ― Emefiele

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) said it has disbursed a total sum of ₦927.94 billion to over 4.5 million smallholder farmers cultivating 21 commodities across the country under the Anchor Borrowers’ Programme (ABP).

Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Mr Godwin Emefiele who disclosed this in Abuja added that between November and December 2021 alone, 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.

He said the figures were thrown up when the Monetary Policy Committee reviewed the performance of the Bank’s intervention programmes aimed at stimulating productivity in manufacturing/industries, agriculture, energy/infrastructure, healthcare and Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs).

Giving further insight, the CBN Governor pointed out 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”.

He noted that the Bank also released N1.76 billion to finance two large-scale agricultural projects under the Commercial Agriculture Credit Scheme (CACS), in addition, to disburse the sum of ₦151.23 billion under the Real Sector Facility to 15 additional projects in agriculture, manufacturing, mining, and services.

According to him, the funds were utilised for both greenfield and brownfield (expansion) projects under the Covid-19 Intervention for the Manufacturing Sector (CIMS) and the Real Sector Support Facility from Differentiated Cash Reserve Requirement (RSSF-DCRR).

“Cumulative disbursements under the Real Sector Facility currently stood at ₦1.40 trillion disbursed to 331 projects across the country,” Emefiele affirmed.

Also, as part of its effort to support the resilience of the healthcare sector, the Bank also disbursed ₦498.00 million to two healthcare projects under the Healthcare Sector Intervention Facility (HSIF), bringing the cumulative disbursements to ₦108.85 billion for 118 projects, comprising of 31 pharmaceuticals, 82 hospital and four other services.

To support households and businesses affected by Covid-19, the Bank disbursed N20.29 billion to 40,521 beneficiaries, comprising 35,340 households and 5,181 small businesses under the Targeted Credit Facility (TCF) within the period.

The cumulative disbursements under the TCF stood at N369.78 billion to 777,666 beneficiaries, comprising 648,052 households and 129,614 small businesses.

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Similarly, to further promote entrepreneurship development among Nigerian youths, the Bank disbursed N293 million to 59 beneficiaries under the recently introduced Tertiary Institutions Entrepreneurship Scheme (TIES).

Under the National Mass Metering Programme (NMMP), the sum of ₦47.83 billion was disbursed for the procurement and installation of 858,026 electricity meters across the country under the Scheme’s Phase-0.

On Electricity, Mr Emefiele informed that the Apex Bank released ₦274.33 billion to power sector players, as part of its effort to support the sector under the Nigeria Bulk Electricity Trading Payment Assurance Facility (NBET-PAF).

This was in addition to the ₦20.58 billion released to Distribution Companies (DisCos) under the Nigeria Electricity Market Stabilisation Facility – Phase 2 (NEMSF-2).

To further support infrastructure development in the gas industry, the Bank released “additional ₦3.00 billion for the augmentation of an existing infrastructure, bringing the cumulative disbursements under the Intervention Facility for National Gas Expansion Programme (IFNGEP) to ₦42.20 billion for six projects”.