Coffee farmer criticises agro credit scheme

MINISTER for Agriculture and Livestock Sir Puka Temu’s announcement to allocate K100 million to the National Development Bank for the agriculture credit support scheme has been criticised.
Coffee farmer and East New Britain Farmers Association deputy chairman Benson Paparai was critical about the tough policies and processes in place before farmers could access such funds.
Paparai said although it was transparent that way, the concern was the difficulty small farmers would face qualifying when seeking access to this fund.
He likened the tough processes to other activities that were allocated such funding.
“The policies and processes are very tough, in the sense that you have to have a huge amount of money to show proof of security, in which case small farmers lose opportunities to big players,” he said.
“These processes need to be changed to make it easier for small farmers and people in rural areas to qualify for funding under this support scheme,” Paparai said.
He called on Sir Puka to direct such funds to provincial institutions so that local farmers could walk in and get proper advice on how to access the funds.
In the case of East New Britain, Paparai said the minister could channel the funds to the Kokopo East New Britain Savings and Loans and Kokopo Micro Finance.
“By doing so, small farmers have greater chances of being eligible for funding.
“And at the same time it reduces time wasted on running around and more time to concentrate on the project,” he said.