Kwara set to partner banks for economic prosperity
Kwara State Governor, Alhaji Abdulfatah Ahmed has said his administration would continue to partner any commercial banks especially in the financing of its economic development programmes.
This, he said would go a long way at enhancing the socio economic development of the populace in the bid to rejuvenate the state’s economy for more prosperity and growth.
Ahmed disclosed this in Ilorin on Tuesday when the Group Managing Director, First City Monument Bank (FCMB), Mr. Ladi Balogun and his management team, paid him a courtesy visit at Government House, Ilorin.
He said that commercial banks would be expected to expand their funding window of agriculture as agribusiness in the State.
According to him, “Agriculture is gradually been de-risked; so it is making it quite enabling for prospective investors to come in here to see how to take advantage of what we have on ground”.
He said: “We have tried to make it as private sector driven as possible.
We have quite a few individuals who have invested in processing which of course creates a lot of room for backward integration that a lot of farmers now go into structured large scale farming culture”.
Ahmed stressed that the prevailing economic challenges in the country made it expedient to explore various strategies in financing economic development.
Responding, Balogun said the bank was exploring new ways of assisting the Kwara State Government in improving its Internally Generated Revenue.
According to him, the bank was ready to take similar initiative of co-operating with the state government in financing agriculture.
[ThisDay]