Scaling up its m-agriculture along with digital & financial inclusion initiatives, Pakistani microfinance Bank Tameer, has joined hands with the government of Punjab for giving out smart digital loans to farmers across Punjab worth in aggregate over Rs2 billion for over 35,000 farmers.
The total scheme announced by the government of Punjab is over Rs 77 billion for 450,000 farmers. The partnership will go on to strengthen the collective efforts put in order to bolster Pakistan’s standing as a major agricultural country by increasing overall yield and productivity of the crops.
Tameer Microfinance Bank has been appointed partner Bank for the programme that will be providing digital loans, digital disbursements and repayment to farmers across Punjab.
The scheme will not only provide interest-free loans but will also address long-existent issues faced by local farmers through smart phone-based crop and weather advisory and comprehensive consultancy services besides maintaining a digital platform to empower the farmers by keeping real-time monitoring and performance evaluation.
To help farmers benefit from the host of digital services, the government of Punjab will distribute smartphones under the scheme to allow farmers access to E-credit scheme (Digital Wallet), weather Alerts, Crop Calendar, E-Zarri Baithak, Agri TV and more.
Commenting about the development, President & CEO Tameer Bank Ali Riaz Chaudhry said:
We are bringing in Telenor Pakistan, Tameer Bank and Easypaisa’s technological infrastructure to support and expedite the government of Punjab’s interest-free loans scheme for small farmers.
We are positive that through calculated and focused implementation, monitoring and support, we will be able to help the farmers increase their yield many folds and contribute additionally to the socio-economic progress of the country.
The Punjab government’s interest-free loan scheme is being led by Ministry of Agriculture & Finance in support from State Bank of Pakistan, Punjab Institute of Technology Board, Ministry of Finance.
Why the Punjab Govt not disbursing loans via Zarai Traqqiati Bank? Tamper bank branches are hard to find even in big cities.