The Agricultural Development Bank PLC (ADB) has been adjudged the winner of the 2022 Highest Value of Guaranteed Agricultural Credit Award.

Instituted by the Ghana Incentive-Based Risk Sharing System for Agricultural Lending (GIRSAL) the Guaranteed Agricultural Credit Award Scheme is to recognise the contribution of financial institutions’ lending to the agricultural sector.

The award is also aimed at best performing facilitators of GIRSAL’s agriculture and agribusiness lending training course for staff of financial institutions.

Presenting the award to the bank in Accra, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of GIRSAL, Kwesi Korboe said that the Bank Rating Scheme was introduced to award Banks for their continuous business engagement and support for increased lending to the growth of the agricultural sector in Ghana.

“Financial Institutions are awarded based on the quality and value of GIRSAL guaranteed agribusiness loans they issue within the year and from our data, ADB emerged as the Bank with the highest value” he said.

Receiving the award, the ADB Managing Director, Alhaji Alhassan Yakubu-Tali, stated that the award was a recognition of the Bank’s promise of harnessing the transformational power of agribusiness for wealth creation.

According to him, the Bank’s commitment is evident in the increase of the Bank’s loan stock from GH¢453.20million in December 2016 to GH¢993.50million by end of third-quarter 2022.

“ADB remains a leading lender to the agricultural sector in the country and we will deepen our collaborations with stakeholders within the sector to make agribusiness much more attractive,” he added.

Alhaji Yakubu-Tali mentioned that the collaboration with GIRSAL was aimed at de-risking agricultural financing by issuing credit guarantees to stakeholders in the agribusiness value chain.

“Issuing out the Guaranteed Agricultural Credit reduces ADB’s losses and increases the Banks risk appetite for lending to agribusinesses at competitive interest rates per annum,” he added.

He thanked GIRSAL for the award and assured stakeholders that the recognition will spur the Bank to commit more to the growth of the agricultural sector.