State Bank of India has entered into an MoU with Jain Farm Fresh Foods to help farmers associated with the company to avail finance against receivables due from the company. The bank said this is an innovative offering that uses corporate’s ecosystem data to digitally enable lending solutions to customers. Farmers’ past performance data with the associated anchor company will be used to assess eligibility and enable loan sanction. A proprietary digital tool has been developed by the bank to facilitate this centralized electronic sanctioning. This solution, unlike traditional agri-lending products moves away from lending based on the farmers’ assets, land holding and financial history. Instead it uses proprietary historical performance data and information from public domain to assess farmer’s eligibility and credit worthiness to sanction the loan. Rajnish Kumar, MD – National Banking Group, SBI said the product is truly pioneering as it provides credit to farmers to make investments in modern agricultural technologies like mechanization, irrigation, etc. resulting in higher productivity and subsequently higher farm income.
