Door-step financing for every need of the farmer at the right time involves proper insights into the process and empathy with the farmer, full knowledge and understanding of his requirements for farm operations, consumption and investment. In spite of more than 100 years of rural cooperatives, and over 40 years of commercial bank lending, such insights were not at par with the money lenders residing in the village. Indigenous bankers, as they can safely be termed, proved their indispensability as they give money on trust and not on the basis of security or guarantee they offer. This book is a collection of select articles written by the author in prominent dailies like The Hindu, Business Line, Financial Express and journals like the Journal of Rural Development, Economic and Political Weekly, Asian Economic Review, INCLUSION among others that provide a history of agricultural banking in the post-independent India. The articles give a perspective as to how the policies have been shaped in the field of agricultural banking. The share of agriculture in GDP has fallen to 12 percent and yet keeping nearly 60 percent of persons depend on it. Farmers are still becoming victims of excessive interest rates and burden of private debt and therefore, the right perspective of institutional lending for agriculture assumes importance. The author has provided insights into how the policies for agricultural banking has evolved over the years and how they are shaping up today. He feels that there is a yawning gap between the post-liberalization and post-nationalization agricultural and rural credit and requires proper orientation towards the farmers. Historical perspective would enable present day bankers to view the emerging requirements right and the policy makers to see the need for integrating policy perspectives of agriculture credit, agricultural marketing, organized retail marketing, value chain management, and world trade in agriculture, cooperatives and food security as a web of activities. It is a must read for academicians, policy makers, policy consultants, cooperators, bankers and other stakeholder groups.
About The Author:
B. Yerram Raju, is a banker turned economist. His contribution to the rural economy and agriculture commenced with his career in the State Bank of India in the second half of sixties. Post-nationalization, his perspectives have significantly contributed to the policy formulation and implementation of agriculture credit programmes. He was Senior Faculty and Vice Principal in the State Bank Institute of Rural Development, Hyderabad. When commercial banks took to financing cooperatives with their takeover of PACS, he started contributing to the growth of cooperatives and his association with the Cooperative Development Foundation on its Board of Trustees helped cooperative advocacy and law. He was invited member of the Expert Committee on Agricultural Indebtedness (2007). He was Consultant, Agricultural Technology Mission of Government of Andhra Pradesh and thereafter served as Member, Expert Committee on Cooperatives to the Government of Andhra Pradesh (2009–11). He served as Member of the Committee set up by the Indian Science Congress in 2004 for formulating the PURA strategy. During the initial years of engagement with the WTO, he was associated with the formation of WTO Cell in Andhra Pradesh and was consulting for UNCTAD. He was also a Member of the RBI Expert Committee on Short-Term Cooperative Credit (2012). He is a Member of the Board of Governors, Farm and Rural Science Foundation, Hyderabad. He is Fellow of Skoch Development Foundation, New Delhi. He has penned a number of other books on agriculture: Andhra Pradesh Vision 2020: Strategy for Sustainable Agricultural Growth (2001), co-authored with N.G.P. Rao, former Vice Chancellor of Pantnagar Agriculture University; Commercial Banks and Rural Development: Issues and Trends (1982); and How and Why of Rural Banking (1987) along with C.L. Khemani, Agricultural Banking, KESDEE, US apart from numerous articles in popular dailies and journals of repute.
