Banks’ credit to the economy rose by N75bn to N43.67tn as of the end of February from N42.92tn in January.
The Central Bank Governor, Godwin Emefiele, disclosed this on Tuesday in Abuja.
He said, “Provisional data showed that banking system credit to the economy increased by 1.75 per cent to N43.67tn in February 2021 from N42.92tn in January 2021, reflecting the ongoing broad-based monetary and fiscal stimulus to various sectors of the economy.
“The committee thus, enjoined the bank to maintain its current drive to improve access to credit to the private sector, while exploring other initiatives with the fiscal authorities to improve funding to critical sectors of the economy.”
In terms of funding, he said, the committee noted that the dank has disbursed funds under its various agricultural interventions towards improving food supply in Nigeira.
The committee noted the disbursement of N107.6bn to 548,109 farmers cultivating 703,619 hectares of land between fourth quarter of 2020 and first quarter of 2021 to boost dry season output in support of agricultural value chain development, he said.
Emefiele said total disbursements as of the end of February amounted to N1.487tn under the various agricultural programmes, of which N686.59bn was disbursed under the Commercial Agricultural Credit Scheme and N601.75bn under the Anchor Borrowers Programmes to 3,038,649 farmers to support food supply and dampen inflationary pressures.
Under the Targeted Credit Facility, he said, the bank has disbursed N218.16bn to 475,376 beneficiaries, of which 34 per cent of beneficiaries were SMEs.
He said, “Under AGSMEIS, N111.62bn has been disbursed to 28,961 beneficiaries, 70 per cent of which are in the agricultural sector.
“Under the Creative Industry Financing Initiatives mainly targeted at youths, N3.19bn has been disbursed to 341 beneficiaries, of which 53 percent is to the movie industry.
“Under the National Mass Metering Programme, N33.45bn has been disbursed to nine distribution companies for the procurement of 605,852 meters, while N89.89bn has been disbursed under the Nigeria Electricity Market Stabilisation Facility to 11 distribution companies to improve the electricity supply industry in Nigeria.”
Under the N100bn Health Care intervention Fund, he said, the bank had disbursed N94.34bn, and was willing to expand the facility, to 85 projects in the pharmaceutical industry, hospitals and state governments for both brown field and green field projects, mostly to expand pharmaceutical drug lines, acquire MRI and other equipment and upgrade laboratories and other hospital services.
