Kwacha to make further gains
By BUSINESS REPORTER ABOUT K25 million has been disbursed towards agricultural activities practised by public service workers from last year to date.
This is according to the Public Service Micro Finance Company acting director business development, Paul Haambote.
Mr Haambote said the service had designed an Agricultural As- set Plus loan scheme meant to support Governments efforts to grow the agricultural sector.
He explained that the company was providing financial solutions for civil servants to boost production and contribute to the Gross Domestic Product of the country.
Mr Haambote was speaking in an interview at the just-ended 92nd Agriculture and Commercial Show celebrated under the theme “Sustainable Economic Empowerment.”
“We are financing anything that is agricultural-related especially the equipment such as tractors, centre pivots and so on. Under this scheme, 150 clients have been serviced valued at K20 to K25 million worth of assets.
“This was launched in January last year and was run for one farming season so we expect numbers to increase during the next farming season,” Mr Haambote said.
Meanwhile, Mr Haambote said that over K340 million worth of loans had been given to public service workers under the personal loan scheme.
“Personal loans are offered to mainstream Government workers at a rate of five percent and it is payable over a duration of five years. The maximum that we pay on that loan is a K50, 000 and on that loan we have financed just over 11,000 civil servants from the time we launched the product to date,” Mr Haambote said.
Other products, included the motor vehicle loans scheme which had seen the disbursement of K80 million from 2016 to date.
Mr Haambote said the company had financed close to 500 vehicles with a net worth of over K80 million from 2016 to date.
“This scheme came up as a result of austerity measures Government undertook from 2015 where they abolished the provision of personal to holder vehicles to any officers that were entitled to own a vehicle in Government.
“So we were mandated to design a scheme that will allow officers to procure vehicles. We finance these vehicles over a period of five years and the interest on those loans is at 18 percent per annum,” Mr Haambote said. By BUSINESS REPORTER THE Kwacha is expected to make further gains in the short term as mid-month conversations gather momentum.
The local currency made a comeback against the dollar on Monday on the backdrop of some corporate inflows from exporters.
According to Cavmont Bank daily market report, the local unit began the day trading at K9.970 / K10.020.
Cavmont indicated that by mid-morning however, the local unit had touched an intra-day high of K9.910 / K9.960 on the interbank bid and offer respectively.
“Market activity was somewhat flat from most importers as they traded the pair cautiously in anticipation of further gains. The local unit is expected to make further gains in the short term as mid-month conversations gather momentum,” the bank said.
On the money market, the commercial banks’ aggregate current account declined by K445.67 million to K1,273.33 million while the overnight borrowing and lending rate was unchanged at 9.98 per cent.
Total funds therefore traded on Interbank was K162 million.
On Friday, financial institutions indicated that despite the negative movement, the local unit was expected to make a comeback in the short term as most corporates on the buy side remained cautious.