Landbank lending to priority sectors reaches P74.7-B in 6 months

The Land Bank of the Philippines (LBP) has breached its full-year target of P74.7 billion in loans and technical assistance package to priority sectors such as agriculture and small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in only the first six months of 2004, a top bank official said.

The priority sectors include the farmers and fisherfolk, SMEs and micro-enterprises, livelihood projects, agribusiness, agri-infrastructure, agri-related projects and environment-related projects.

The lending window, which represents roughly 60 percent of LBP’s total P123.5-billion loan portfolio, included P10.8 billion in credit and technical assistance under the Agriculture and Fisheries Modernization Act (AFMA) and another P5.5 billion for the SME Unified Lending Opportunities for National Growth (SULONG) program.

The AFMA loan releases represent 59 percent of LBP’s P18.2 billion target, benefiting more than 218,000 small farmers and fisherfolks nationwide and generating almost 45,000 new jobs.

"We are the largest contributor to this priority program for agriculture modernization and job generation," LBP president and chief executive officer Gary B. Teves said.

He explained that credit support for AFMA consists of five components, namely: production, processing and manufacturing (P7.6 billion); farmers-fisherfolk marketing assistance (P2.7 billion); post-harvest facilities (P188 million); other infrastructure (P187 million); and irrigation (P14.7 million).

In addition, LBP released P81 million for the capacity-building program of farmers and fisherfolk cooperatives and local government units.

Teves said more than 5,000 SMEs nationwide benefited from loan releases of P5.5 billion in the first semester under the SULONG program.

The People’s Credit and Finance Corp. (PCFC), an attached agency of the LBP, recorded cumulative loans of P5.9 billion for the SME sector as of end-May this year and continues to benefit some 1.5 million poor borrowers, 98 percent of whom are women. For the five-month period, PCFC extended loans to more than 173,000 new poor borrowers.

Of LBP’s total releases, loans to the agribusiness sector reflected the largest share at 15 percent or P18.2 billion. This was followed by loans to SMEs and micro-enterprises with about 13 percent share or P16.6 billion of total loan portfolio.

Loans to farmers and fisherfolk reached P14.9 billion, representing a 12-percent share while agri-infrastructure and agri-related projects accounted for P10.2 billion and P10 billion, respectively, both accounting for about eight percent share. Loans to livelihood and environment-related projects accounted for two percent each.

Teves said LBP decided to return to its original mandate of providing credit to the agri-agra sector in 2000 when lending to priority sectors dwindled to 34 percent of its total loan portfolio. Since then, it successfully increased the share of priority sectors to 60 percent of the total loan portfolio in less than four years.