Information for fruit and vegetables business in CIS
Zakarpattya farmers are not willing to take loans
As we informed before, this year Zakarpattya farmers got a unique opportunity to take an interest-free loan for production needs. Such opportunity was created due to the joint efforts of the Zakarpattya farmers' and land owners' association, Oblast State administration and the regional Prominvestbank office.
However, according to the information provided by Julia Peleshkey, the Chairman of the Zakarpattya farmers' and land owners' association, to the beginning of September, the end of the agricultural season, only UAH 200 thousands have been used out of UAH 1 mln. allocated by the Farmer Support Foundation. 14% of these funds were spent on loan compensation for the newly created farms; 30% were used to repay loans on first tractor, truck, ag machinery, construction or reconstruction of the premises. We'll point out that according to the agreement with the Oblast State administration, for Zakarpattya farmers the balance of the interest rate was also compensated by means of the oblast budget funds, so that the loan turned out to be "free of charge". As Julia Peleshkey says, the allocated funds are used to such a small extent, that the rest of money can be reallocated to the other regions. Many oblasts have spent their funds, so Zakarpattya farmers should hurry to use this advantage.
The local farmers explain their unwillingness to apply for such loans by the fact that it is quite difficult to compile a great number of documents for the loan. But, as Ms. Peleshkey proves, these are vain fears. The compensation of the loan interest rate takes place after its approval, in case of refusal a farmer will have to pay the interests fully. There have been no groundless refusals to this moment, but the borrowers are nevertheless threatened.