The centre has, in recent years, in consultation with the Reserve Bank of India and NABARD, initiated several measures for providing loans to farmers.

In a written reply in response to a minister of state for agriculture Kanti Lal Bhuria stated in the Lok Sabha today that t some of the important measures are:

1. Banks have been advised to simplify the procedure for documentation for agricultural loans

2. Effective from kharif 2006-07, the government has lowered the interest rates on crop loans to 7 per cent with an upper interest limit of Rs3 lakh. It has been decided to continue this policy for the year 2007-08 also 

3. Loans up to Rs50,000 have been made freed from the burden of collaterals and margins

4 Banks have been advised to provide all eligible farmers with kisan credit cards to enable farmers to avail easy access to credit

5 Under agri clinic and agri business centre scheme, credit linked capital subsidy of 25 per cent of the capital cost of the project are funded through banks. The scheme has been envisaged with a view to provide extension and other services to farmers on payment basis. The subsidy would be 33.33 per cent in respect of candidates belonging to SC / ST, women and other disadvantaged sections and those from north eastern and hill states

6. To improve the outreach among the poor and the informal sector, the self-help group-bank linkage programme was intensified, particularly in 13 priority states (Assam, Bihar, Chhatisgarh, Gujarat, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Uttranchal and West Bengal) with vast majority of the rural poor. Banks have also been advised to finance joint liability groups and tenant farmers'''' groups

7. As part of the measures announced by the Reserve Bank of India for financial inclusion, banks have been advised to open no-frills accounts and issue simple overdraft facility against such accounts. Banks have also been advised to issue general credit cards up to Rs25,000 without insisting on security and end use of funds;

8. Banks have been advised to undertake, on a pilot basis, 100 per cent financial inclusion in at least one district in each state. Based on the success of the pilot, the state level bankers committee in the states will draw a time bound plan for achieving 100 per cent financial inclusion in other districts of the state;

9. To improve the financial outreach, detailed guidelines for banking correspondent / banking facilitator models have been provided to banks; and

10. In order to examine the issue of financial exclusion in greater depth and to suggest measures for promoting financial inclusion, the Government had appointed a committee on financial inclusion under the chairmanship of Dr C Rangarajan.

Based on the interim recommendations of the committee, the government has announced creation of two funds - financial inclusion fund and financial inclusion technology fund in the Union Budget for 2007-08.