Agriculture And Allied Loan

Agriculture is treated as the backbone to the economy of Manipur. About 76% of the State’s total
working population is engaged in agriculture and nearly 9.41% of the total geographical area is
used for cultivation. Manipur produces considerable quantity of paddy, wheat, maize, pulses and
oilseeds like mustard, groundnut, soya bean and sunflower etc. But almost all of the farmers are
marginal and small poor farmers. Naturally they lack initial investment and they are exploited by
landlords and traders.

To ease the burden on the farmers SEVA- Manipur launch Agri and Allied loans. These loans are
provided in both material form and cash credit. The payment option of the Agri and allied loan is
made very flexible to make repayment easy for the farmers. For example loan provided for
production of vegetables could be paid after the sales of the produce. This fund are payable
through easy EMIs in period of agreed time frame. The interest charge on this micro credit is bare
minimum.

The loan amount, payment method and interest rate are flexible to make sure that the farmer
could put all its effort and energy to produce a healthy yield and worry less about the immediate
problem face due to lack of funds. Farmers are provided knowledge and valuable inputs besides
the monetary help from SEVA- AIC (Agri information centre). Farmers are also given healthy
seedlings and saplings through SEVA-AIC Nursery Unit under the Agri and allied loans, which
could be repaid after harvesting of the said seedlings. The main aim of the Agri and Allied loans
aim to encourage farmers to adopt double cropping in the field which were left fellow traditionally
increasing the income of a farmer exponentially and thereby improving their socio-economic
stature of farmers in the state Manipur.