In a first, 3 Bihar farmers pledge e-warehouse receipts

In a first, three farmers from Samastipur district in Bihar, who opened their repository accounts on the National e-Repository Ltd (NERL) platform, have pledged their electronic negotiable warehouse receipts (eNWRs) with a financing firm to avail loan.

In Samastipur, 16 farmers have opened their repository accounts with the NERL, out of which nine of them have generated eNWRs recently, the company Wednesday said in a statement.

These eNWRs have been pledged with a non-banking finance company Svakarma Finance, which is a repository participant with NERL.

The farmers' repository accounts have been opened for commodities which will be stored in a Warehousing Development and Regulatory Authority (WDRA) registered warehouse in Samastipur, managed by ERGOS Business Solutions.

Warehouse receipts are issued in negotiable form, making them eligible as collateral for loans under the Warehouse (Development and Regulation) Act, 2007. The sector is regulated by the WDRA.

"With Samastipur, this is the beginning, where 16 farmers have directly come to NERL for opening an account. This is the first time for farmers to avail pledging benefits from eNWR and we hope this encourages more farmers to come on board," NERL Managing Director and CEO Kedar Deshpande said.

The company hopes to empower farmers with a service that will help them manage their storage documents with ease and give better access to credit facilities, he added.

Since the start of its operations in September 2017, NERL said about 77 repository accounts have been opened directly by farmers and Farmer Producers' Organisations (FPOs) on its platform but it is for the first time three Samastipur farmers pledged their warehouse receipts with a finance firm.

Otherwise, over 230 private, central and state agri-warehouses are using the NERL platform for generating eNWRs. Total eNWRs has crossed the 46,000 mark for over 3.5 lakh tonnes of commodities till date.

NERL is promoted by National Commodity and Derivatives Exchange Limited (NCDEX), National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD), ICICI Bank and SBI.

It is the second company after Central Depository Services Ltd (CDSL) to get permission by the WDRA to provide warehouse depository services.