BPI to expand agri loan portfolio this year

MANILA, Philippines - Ayala-led Bank of Philippines Islands (BPI) will continue to expand its loan portfolio for agribusiness this year, a ranking bank official said.

BPI executive vice president and corporate banking group head Alfonso Salcedo Jr. said the bank’s agribusiness book now stood over P20 billion.

“We would want to push for that (continue supporting and giving out agribusiness loans) this year,” he said.

Salcedo said the bank would want to be part of promoting inclusive growth and one way to achieve this is for it to continue to lend to agriculture sector.

“There are a lot of people in the countryside. This is one of our main thrusts this year (to help promote inclusive growth in the countryside),” he said.

Last year, BPI rolled out a new product, BPI Agribusiness Solutions (BAS), to help boost the bank’s agribusiness portfolio.

BAS was lunched in March 2013 to cater to commercial poultry raisers and hog farmers which BPI calls as “agripreneurs”.

The product is being offered by BPI in partnership with Genus Pig Improvement Co. (Genus PIC), an international leader in providing genetically superior pig breeding stock and technical support for maximizing genetic potential to commercial pork producers.

It was noted that agriculture sector has contributed 12.3 percent or P11.9 billion of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP) in 2011.