ISLAMABAD, April 12: The Zarai Taraqiati Bank Ltd (ZTBL) has maintained its position as the main source of farm credit as it substantially extended its outreach by disbursing Rs56 billion among 475,756 borrowers through ‘zarkhaiz’ and ‘sadabahar’ schemes.

Out of this amount, the share of small farmers was Rs47 billion thus constituting 84 per cent of the total credit disbursed, said a press release issued here on Saturday.

The robust recovery of Rs63 billion and the increased deposit of Rs4.3 billion raised the ZTBL’s pre-tax profit to Rs1.784 billion, registering an unprecedented growth of 176 per cent in the year ending on December 31, 2007.

The financial consolidation earned through highest-ever profit was mainly due to enormous increase in volume of recovery amounting to Rs5.1 billion registering a growth of 76 per cent over the previous year.

Out of total credit disbursement in the last year, the loans of Rs50 billion were disbursed for production purposes i.e. for seeds, fertiliser, pesticides and other input loans against Rs47 billion disbursed last year.

Rs6 billion were disbursed for development purposes mainly for farm equipment/mechanisation, tube-wells and tractors as against Rs4.7 billion given in the previous year.

On the deposit side, the bank managed to raise its deposits to Rs4.3 billion, which grew by 50 per cent, thus adding to its financial viability for provision of more banking services to its customers, particularly rural clientele and increase the volume of credit to be disbursed this year.

The impressive growth in all its operations reflected bank’s commitment towards uplifting of agriculture sector for sustainable financial growth in line with the government’s efforts to alleviate rural poverty through the farm-led growth, the press release added.--APP