The Agricultural Bank of Egypt continues its expansion plan towards achieving rapid growth rates at various levels, and working to provide specialized products that meet the needs of those in charge of the agricultural sector and related industrial activities, and to stimulate investment in the agricultural sector in all its productive fields.
In an interview with, Alaa Farouk, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Agricultural Bank; To get acquainted with the results achieved by the bank at the end of last year, and the most important goals.
What is the rate of financing small and medium enterprises from the total credit portfolio of the bank?
Farouk: The bank achieved a growth in the volume of loans directed to financing medium, small and micro activities by up to 73% of the loan portfolio. At the same time, the bank did not ignore the importance of financing major projects and companies. To maximize their role in supporting and developing the national economy, and their ability to provide direct and indirect job opportunities.
He added: The number of major companies financed by the bank increased from 14 companies on June 30, 2020, with a financing volume of about 713 million pounds, to 65 companies currently whose financing volume exceeds 4.5 billion pounds.
He continued, “The bank doubled the volume of financing directed to the production of agricultural crops, during the past year, due to the bank’s adoption of new policies aimed at adjusting the credit categories for agricultural crops by rates ranging between 25 and 70% for some crops, especially strategic crops, to help farmers bear the high costs of production and agricultural requirements, to reach the size of Crop loans finance more than EGP 11 billion, benefiting more than 300,000 farmers.
What is the size of the bank’s financing in the veal project?
Farouk: The Agricultural Bank is the largest bank financing the national project to revive the veal, bringing the total funding granted by the bank to more than 4 billion pounds, granted to more than 27 thousand beneficiaries to raise about 300 thousand head of livestock during the years 2020 and 2021.
Tell us about the bank’s role in the “Decent Life” initiative, and the most important efforts the bank has made in this direction.
Farouk: The Agricultural Bank is doubling its efforts to contribute to the implementation of the objectives of the presidential initiative (a decent life) to develop rural villages with the aim of improving the quality of life in the countryside, providing a decent life for village residents by providing job opportunities for youth, empowering rural women, and expanding the availability of banking services. financing in all villages, enhancing financial inclusion, and supporting environmental targets.
He said: During the last period, the bank intensified its efforts to expedite the completion of the development of all its branches in the villages of the first phase of the initiative, within the bank’s comprehensive plan that aims to develop about 670 branches throughout the Republic.
He added: During the past few months, the bank has completed receiving 120 of the newly developed branches, of which 27 serve hundreds of villages included in the initiative, in addition to establishing new branches in the targeted villages.
He said: The bank aims to be the largest in spreading the ATM network in the villages, and has already completed the installation of more than 1,000 ATMs out of the 2,000 targeted to be deployed in the villages.
What is the amount of funding in the “Bab Rizk” program for the development of microenterprises?
Farouk: During the year 2021, the volume of lending to the Bab Rizq program, which aims to finance micro-enterprises and empower rural women, amounted to about 56 million pounds, benefiting from the program 6,153 clients during the recent period.
The bank is working to develop the mass transportation system and provide safe transportation for village residents, especially in the governorates of Upper Egypt and the Delta, by financing the project to replace the semi-transportation cars (Kbots) that are used to transport passengers with modern microbuses; The total number of cars amounted to 606 pickups, with a financing value of 110 million pounds, in addition to financing the replacement of tuk-tuks and their replacement with minivans in a number of decent life villages, especially in North Sinai.
