Karimnagar DCCB to help farmers take up oil palm cultivation

Karimnagar: In order to encourage the farmers take up oil palm cultivation in the integrated Karimnagar district, the District Cooperative Central Bank (DCCB) with the support of the State government has decided to make tripartite agreement with all the stakeholders such as seed or saplings supplier, drip irrigation firms and oil companies and the farmers and DCCB.

As part of the agreement, the bank would ensure that the seed/drip irrigation and oil companies provide all the necessary inputs to the farmers to take up oil palm cultivation on a large scale. The bank would make a tie-up with the oil companies and farmers to ensure that the companies procure the produce directly from the farmers and deposit the amount in the farmers' bank account so that there would not be any confusion in the procurement.

Participating as chief guest at the closing ceremony of the three-day training programme on the computerised generation of statements and audits for the PACS CEOs and operators at the DCCB main branch in Karimnagar town on Thursday (July 7), Konduru Ravinder Rao, chairman, NAFSCOB, TSCAB and Karimnagar DCCB, made this announcement to encourage oil palm cultivation as part of diversification of cropping pattern among the farmers.

Stating that the training programme was taken up as part of the strengthening of the PACS (primary agricultural cooperative societies), he said that the DCCB had decided to provide composite loans of Rs 1 crore to each PACS, whose recovery rate is 90 per cent and Karshaka Mitra assistance of Rs 50 lakhs to each PACS, whose recovery rate is 80 per cent.

Following the closure of petrol filling stations operated by PACS, he said that he had requested Union Minister for Cooperation Amit Shah to consider the petrol stations of PACS as retail outlets. He also informed the PACS function on par with the banks and expanded their activities in the villages.

DCCB CEO N Satyanarayana Rao informed the PACS CEOs and operators to ensure that they completely fill the details such as Aadhar card numbers, mobile phones, description of ornaments details, purpose of loans sanctioned etc to ensure transparency. He said that they would soon launch the SMS alerts to inform the customers about the due dates of payment of loans.

NABARD DDM P Ananth said that they had taken up the training of PACS CEOs and operators to ensure system generated audit reports to ensure transparency. He also advised the PACS to be alert about cyber security. PACS development cell resource person G Satyanarayana, CTI faculty member Subba Rao, DCCB general manager Prabhakar Reddy and others were also present.