Bengal agri credit to cross ₹1L cr for first time

Kolkata: For the first time, agriculture sector credit disbursement in Bengal will cross Rs 1 lakh crore in the current fiscal, said the chief general manager of Nabard, P K Bharadwaj, on Friday on the sidelines of the State Credit Seminar 2026. The seminar was attended by state finance secretary Prabhat Mishra and agriculture secretary Onkar Singh Meena.Agriculture credit was Rs 97,000 crore in the last fiscal. The GM of the State Level Bankers Committee, Balbir Singh, said this year's target for agriculture was Rs 1.2 lakh crore, and out of that, Rs 91,000 crore has already been achieved. "This year we shall achieve all targets, be it MSMEs, agriculture, or other priority sector lending," he added. Other priority sector lending includes horticulture, floriculture, animal husbandry, and fishing.
Bharadwaj said the target for agro lending in 2026-27 is Rs 1.4 lakh crore. The total priority sector credit target for the next financial year stands at Rs 3.9 lakh crore, up from Rs 3.8 lakh crore for the current financial year. "The growth rate of agriculture here is 4-5%, which is good," he added.He said agro credit recovery here was above 90%, which is second only to self-help groups, which have a recovery rate of 99%. On MSME credit, he said in 2025-26, the target was Rs 2.1 lakh crore and, by Dec 31, 2025, Rs 1.9 lakh crore had been achieved. Meena earlier said that food grain production in Bengal increased by 28% in the last decade, and cold storage capacity was 91 lakh tonnes.