Various entities of the Azcuba Business Group, and others belonging to the Ministry of Agriculture, stand out among those that have benefited from the advice and loans offered by the Bank of Credit and Commerce (BANDEC), which has extended these financial incentives from the State for food production in this eastern Cuban province.

Las Tunas, Cuba - BANDEC has offered financial benefits to basic units of cooperative production, agricultural and credit and services cooperatives, usufructuaries, individual farmers and companies, to foster short-cycle crops for a total amount exceeding six million 500 thousand pesos in recent months.

Already since 2016, explained its specialists, the production units and individual farmers who grew grains like corn, beans, rice, and sorghum had been stimulated with a 50 percent decrease in interest rates. Now, they said, producers of plantain, taro, potato, cassava and sweet potato, as well as some of the livestock branches, have again obtained a reduction between 2.5 and 3.5 percent. In addition, the rates for the Collection Company fell to three and 3.5 percent.

BANDEC's commitment to agriculture is important, as more than two-thirds of its loan portfolio in Las Tunas is dedicated to this sector; at the same time, economists and agricultural engineers are employed by collegiate bodies to determine the approval of bank financing applications.

Stimulating access to credit through fiscal and monetary incentives, especially those related to interest rates, is one of the strategic objectives of the domestic banking system to face the global economic crisis aggravated by the new coronavirus pandemic, stressed recently the Minister-President of the Central Bank of Cuba, Marta Wilson González. The directive did not specify whether the idea of creating an agricultural development bank would ultimately be implemented, but she did make clear the purpose of the loans going directly to the producer.