Nabard records 7% drop in total business in Karnataka

The National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (Nabard) on Friday reported a total business of Rs 13,859 crore in Karnataka during 2017-18, a decline of 7% over the previous year. In 2016-17, Nabard's total business stood at Rs 14,912 crore.

The decline in business during FY18 was attributed to a prolonged drought in the State which impacted the off take of ground level credit and term loan disbursals. Also, conversion of three NBFCs into small banks affected the business overall, a top official of Nabard said.

"Due to conversion of three NBFCs – Ujjivan, Disha and Janalakshmi – into small finance banks led to lower business during the year. During the previous year, these three firms accounted for Rs 2,000 crore," M I Ganagi, Chief General Manager, Nabard Karnataka Region told reporters.

He said the long term refinance disbursements from Nabard to banks for financing agriculture and allied activities touched Rs 6,430 crore during 2017-18. This amounts to 9% of the total long term refinance disbursed by Nabard across the country.

During the year, Nabard also disbursed Rs 4,695 crore to cooperative banks and RRBs/SBI for crop loans. An amount of Rs 1,284 crore has been disbursed to district central cooperative banks (DCCBs) in Karnataka towards non-agriculture purposes for improving its business portfolio and is the highest by any regional office in the country, Ganagi added.

During 2017-18, Nabard disbursed a total loan assistance of Rs 380.56 crore to Government of Karnataka (Rs 26.38 crore to Department of Agricultural Marketing (DAM) and Rs 354.18 crore to Karnataka State Warehousing Corporation) which is highest in the country, thus taking the cumulative disbursement under Warehouse Infrastructure Fund (WIF) to Rs 739 crore.