An Economic Study of Crop Financing by Prathama Bank: How Small and Marginal Farmers are Benefited from Crop Financing in Uttar Pradesh, India?

One of the salient features of the agrarian economy of India is preponderance of small and marginal farmers. Technological break-through in agriculture has created a great potential for increasing agricultural production. To step up the tempo of agricultural production it is imperative that the farmers must be provided adequate, timely and less costly credit to meet heavy requirement of modern technology in agriculture. RRBs have come in a big way to provide credit to farmers. With respect to crop production, the crop loan has been more popular among the small and marginal farmers because of its purposes and nature for which it is granted. The crop loan facility to them is supposed to have had a positive impact on crop production, net income and employment on their farms. Therefore, credit widening and deepening efforts should be made by improving credit absorption capacity through hassle-free loaning process, augmentation of technology flow and providing supporting infrastructure to the small and marginal farmers with inadequate funds for crop production.