1.6 million northerners have no access to credit facilities

Tamale, Aug. 19, GNA- More than 1.6 million people, mostly farmers in the Northern, Upper East and Upper West regions have no access to credit facilities to expand their businesses.

This is because majority of the rural banks in the three regions are accessible to only a limited number of people. Mr. Sylvester Adongo, Northern Regional Director of the Ministry of Food and Agriculture said this at the launch of the "Association of Church-Based Development (ACDEP) Financial Services (AFS) Project in Tamale on Tuesday.

The Project was launched on the theme: "Linking farmer-based organisations to financial services for improved production and productivity."

The Project is intended to develop a business and implementation plan for the establishment of an independent, self-sustainable micro-finance support service system for farmers. Mr. Adongo explained that the banks are also unable to give credit to farmers because of their low capital base, limited number of personnel and lack of transport to reach the rural people. He said another constraint was the fact that the 10 rural banks that existed in the North were all located in the district capitals. Mr. Adongo said the low repayment record was recognised as one of the main challenges to micro-finance but expressed the hope that with the support of the Savanna farmers company, the rural and community banks in collaboration with ACDEP agricultural stations, farmers would achieve high production.

Mr. Malex Alebikiya, Executive Director of ACDEP said the activities of his organisation was to complement governments efforts to expand services such as schools, hospitals and other interventions such as agricultural production in the communities.

He noted that there are lot resources in the North to be tapped to improve the living conditions of the people.

The Executive Director said in 2004, ACDEP established the Savanna Farmers Marketing Company as an outlet to support the production of farmers by providing ready market for their produce.

He said the AFS was complementing the work of the community banks by linking them to institutions to ensure that farmers had access to credit and would be able to pay back loans to support investments in agriculture.