ISLAMABAD: Tens of thousands of small farmers/borrowers will benefit from the legislative amendments passed by National Assembly regarding provision of legal protection to e-passbook. This year on June 7, the lower house passed, “The Loans for Agricultural, Commercial and Industrial Purposes (LACIP) (Amendment) Bill 2019”.
Since 2017, the Zarai Taraqiati Bank Ltd (ZTBL), State Bank of Pakistan (SBP and Ministry of Finance had been briefing the lawmakers about the importance of the bill and its impacts on agriculture sector in the country.
“We are glad that the political leadership realized the importance of the bill. The farmers and ZTBL had been waiting for years for the passage of the bill. Finally, it sailed through National Assembly. This legislation is destined to herald a green revolution,” President ZTBL asserts.
He said Pakistan being an agriculture country needed farmers’ friendly legislation adding majority of farmers had small landholdings. “This kind of legislation gives ownership to small farmers. We are glad that political leadership has started focusing on legislation meant for small farmers,” the President added.
The e-passbook is a document though which small farmers can get loans for agriculture purposes, however, there was no legal coverage of the e-passbook.
After the passage of the bill, e-passbook has got legal protection and now farmers can avail agriculture loans on subsidized mark-up.
Hasan Raza, Head Legal Affairs Division ZTBL said that the passage of the bill is landmark legislation for farmers and agriculture sector. Now, the e-passbook has a legal protection.
“Credit must go to the government for passing the legislation in the greater interest of borrowers and lending financial institutions, he maintained.
“After the computerization of land record, land owners can now easily get their e-passbooks unlike the past when the farmers would run from pillar-to-post for getting the manual passbooks,” Qadeer Javed, Head Credit Policy ZTBL said.—PR
Copyright Business Recorder, 2021
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