Kisan Credit Card for livestock, dairy, fishery farmers

On Monday, the Union Minister of Fisheries, Animal Husbandry & Dairying Parshottam Rupala virtually launched the ‘Nationwide AHDF KCC campaign’. The Kisan Credit Card (KCC) will be extended to all eligible animal husbandry, dairy and fishery farmers in India from November 15, 2021, to February 15, 2022. It is targeting to enroll approximately two crore people in these next three months.

Image credit: PIB

The Kisan Credit Card initiative dates back to the Budget 2018-19, when the government had announced extension of the KCC facility to animal husbandry farmers and fishermen to help them meet their working capital requirements. Addressing the event, the minister said the campaign aims to provide KCCs to all eligible animal husbandry, dairy and fishery farmers in the country and ensure that they get institutional credit. The Department of Animal Husbandry and Dairying, Department of Fisheries and Department of Financial Services are managing this initiative.

Department of Animal Husbandry and Dairying Atul Chaturvedi , who was also present at the event, said there are 9-10 crore farmers estimated to be engaged in animal husbandry and dairy sector while there are 1.5 crore fishermen in the country. He stated that the farmers can get a credit limit Rs 1.6 lakh on the KCC without any collateral. Jatindra Nath Swain, Secretary of Department of Fisheries, added that in the absence of institutional credit, he said fishermen have to take credit from money lenders at a very high interest rates.

Meanwhile, Debashish Panda, Secretary of Department of Financial Services, explained “In the last couple of weeks, we have had a series of meetings in the last couple how to step up the campaign in order to ensure that the targets set by the departments are achieved in the form of issuance of credit card to farmers across the country.”