BAAC to issue 2 million credit card to farmers
The government is going ahead with its plan to issue more credit cards to farmers through the Bank for Agriculture and Agricultural Cooperatives (BAAC).
Another 2 million credit cards will be issued to farmers next year.
Although it had planned to issue 2 million cards last year, BAAC could issue only 800,000 cards. Total spending on those cards amounted to Bt500 million this year, with 70 per cent spent on the purchase of fertilizers.
The government will expand the cards to cover farmers in field crops, horticultural crops and fishermen instead of focusing only on rice farmers.
Arun Lertvilai, executive vice president of BAAC, said the bank plans to double the number of cards to 4 million as planned in the second phase, which will be launched within next year.
To facilitate the campaign, the BAAC board has approved an additional budget of Bt54 million to develop information technology in the second phase after Bt177 million was approved to smooth the first-phase operation.
The budget will be for purchase of another 400 units of credit card swipe machines from the current 2,600 machines. In addition, the bank will seek more shops to join the project.
The BAAC plans to issue 2 million cards to farmers by the end of its fiscal year in March next year.
However, farmers’ spending has been well below the target, with total spending reaching only Bt500 million compared with the government target of Bt13 billion to 14 billion.
Under the government restrictions, 30 per cent of farmers’ spending through credit card should be for purchase of necessities such as fertilizers, insecticides, seeds and oil. Farmers are exempted from interest for five months.
