Financing Agriculture: Selected Approaches for the Engagement of Commercial Finance

This is part of AgriFin’s collection of resources which include brief technical notes, lessons learned reports, and articles examining a broad range of topics related to sustainable agricultural finance.

The chapter concentrates on the practical interface between the commercial financial sector and the growth of agricultural value chains. It is divided into three sections. The first section, Finance for All looks at the role of rural, savings-led financial service providers. The second section, Finance for Markets focuses on buyer and supplier finance, followed by the third section, Finance for Growth, which discusses commercial bank finance of agribusinesses. The authors argue that for African agriculture to grow, it will need access to the big balance-sheet lending of sophisticated and rapidly growing commercial banking systems in many African markets.