The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has revealed that it disbursed ₦1.452 trillion to 337 large real sector projects in agriculture, manufacturing, services, and mining under the Real Sector Support Facility as part of the effort to diversify the country’s economic base.
Osita Nwanisobi, CBN’s Director of Corporate Communications made this known on Sunday during “CBN Special Day” at the ongoing 33rd Enugu International Trade Fair.
He said that ₦948 billion was disbursed to 4,478,381 smallholder farmers under the Anchor Borrowers’ Programme.
Nwanidobi revealed that through the Anchor Borrowers’ Programme, the beneficiary farmers have cultivated 5.2 million hectares of farmland, while 12.6 million direct and indirect jobs have been created across Nigeria.
He also said that the CBN had extended the interest rate of 5% across all its intervention loans to March, 2023.
He said “the recently launched Tertiary Institutions Entrepreneurship Scheme (TIES) is an innovative financing model that will create jobs, enhance the entrepreneurial ecosystem and support economic growth and development through Agribusiness, Creative Industry, Science & Technology and Information Technology/software development.
“The broad objective of the 100 for 100 Policy on Production and Productivity (PPP) is to boost production and productivity, necessary to transform and jumpstart the productive base of the Nigerian economy.
“It is also expected that the Initiative will reverse the nation’s over-reliance on imports, by creating an ecosystem that targets and supports the right companies and projects with the potential to immediately transform Nigeria’s productive base every 100 days.”
“The Bank has so far disbursed the sum of ₦29.51 billion to 31 projects, comprising 16 in manufacturing, 13 in agriculture, and 2 in the healthcare sector. The RT200 FX Programme, which stands for the “Race to US$200 billion in FX Repatriation was recently announced by the CBN in consultation with the Bankers’ Committee.”
He added, “under our Targeted Credit Facility (TCF), which was meant to cushion the severe effects of the Covid-19 pandemic, we have disbursed ₦368.79 billion to 778,000 beneficiaries comprising 648,052 households and about 130,000 SMEs.
“The Bank also recently disbursed $8.50 billion to 6 healthcare projects under the Healthcare Sector Intervention Facility (HSIF), bringing the cumulative disbursements to ₦116.72 billion for 124 projects, comprising 31 pharmaceuticals, 56 hospitals, and 37 other health-related services.
“As part of the effort to further support the resilience of the healthcare sector, an additional tranche of ₦14.7 million was disbursed to five Researchers under the Healthcare Sector Research and Development (HSRD) Grant.”
