Smallholder farmers in the Afram Plains South of the Eastern Region are to benefit from credit facilities.
The facilities are being made available by the Pan African Savings and Loans Limited in partnership with AgroCenta, under their Financial Inclusion for Small Holder Farmers in Africa Project (FISFAP) and Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA)
The aim of the partnership is to provide loans and financial advisory services to all small holder farmers in order to expand their farming businesses.
Emelia Desiree Atta-Fynn, MD, Pan-African, said as part of her outfit’s strategies to promote financial inclusion and improve livelihoods of its customers, Pan-African embraces collaborative opportunities to offer financial services to the economically active in society.
She said “the quest of exploring innovative means of doing business and in meeting the needs of our target group led them to partner with AgroCenta, a company that connects the small holder farmers in the staple food (rice, maize, millet and soybean) value chain to a wider online market to trade, to access truck delivery services and get real-time market information, all from their mobile phones through the use of SMS and voice services.”
“This partnership is strongly supported by AGRA, a farmer-centered African-led, and partnership-driven institution that is transforming Africa’s small holder farming to businesses at the same time advocating for an enabling policy environment”, Madam Atta-Fynn explained.
Amanda Anipu, Programme Officer, AGRA, said “AGRA aims at partnering small holder farmers to expand their businesses.”
According to AGRA the reason it embarked on this initiative to support everyone in the food chain supply is that, they envision, in the future, using online sales of farm produce
Francis Obirikorang, CEO, Agrocenta said the programme is expected to give out loans to over 300 farmers which includes crop insurance and pensions to make life easier when they cannot farm anymore.
Pan-African over the years has leveraged technology to achieve its corporate goals of making the financial sector relevant to the low-income earners and businesses.
With the introduction of Quick, a mobile financial product, customers can now have access to their bank accounts with the company from any location at any time.
BY TIMES REPORTER
