CBN Increases COVID 19 Support Fund Due to Pressure |The Source

By Tosin Olatokunbo

Governor Godwin Emefiele of the Central bank of Nigeria, CBN has disclosed that the N150 billion Targeted Credit Facility, TCF, a credit arrangement meant to support households and businesses, hit by the corona virus pandemic has been drawn down by beneficiaries

The development has now made the apex bank to increase the facility to N300 billion to give opportunities to more households and businesses.

The CBN stated this in a report titled ‘Response by the Monetary and Fiscal Authorities to COVID-19’.

Emefiele said“The increase is to accommodate many more beneficiaries and boost consumer expenditure which should positively impact output growth.

“Given the impact on COVID-19 on key economic variables earlier mentioned, the fiscal and monetary authorities took unprecedented measures to prevent any long-term damage to the growth prospects of our economy.”

The apex bank governor said the fund is already being disbursed to qualified households and small businesses through the NIRSAL Micro Finance bank, adding that at least N149 billion has been disbursed to over beneficiaries..

The TCF guidelines provide that eligible small business can get as much as N25 million while qualified households can receive a maximum of N3 million each.

The CBN governor also stated that, the decision to strengthen the Loan to Deposit ratio, LDR has paid off, as it has resulted in significant rise in loans provided by financial institutions to their customers.

He said “Total gross credit rose by over 21 percent over the past year, from N15.5 trillion to N19.54 trillion. The apex bank, he added has also disbursed Agri- Business/Small and Medium Enterprise Investment Scheme, AGSMEIS (N92.90 billion to 24,702 beneficiaries), Anchor Borrowers Program, ABP by the sum of N164.91 billion to 954,279 beneficiaries.”

Recall also that the apex bank, at the break of COVID 19, created credit facilities for many sectors in the economy to help them recover from the shock created by the pandemic. For instance,  over N700 billion was set aside for the manufacturing sector to boost production.