NEARLY TWO months post demonetisation, online bank transfers seem to have made inroads in rural areas of Pune.
Of the 800 primary milk producers’ cooperative societies, which procure milk for the Pune District Cooperative Milk Producers’ Society, popularly known as Katraj Dairy, more than 400 societies have started directly transferring money into accounts of the farmers, doing away with cash transactions.
Like majority of the agri-based industries, the dairy industry has traditionally been cash-intensive. The district level union pays the primary societies through bank transfer, which in turn withdraw the cash to pay the farmers in cash.
Dairy farmers prefer to be paid in cash to pay for fodder, supplements and other inputs required for their animals. Dr Vivek Ksheersagar, managing director of Katraj Dairy, said the dairy transfers milk payment worth Rs 8 crore to the societies every 15 days. Due to the extensive penetration of the Pune District Central Cooperative Bank (PDCCB), majority of the societies maintain accounts with them.
Post demonetisation, the PDCCB, like other DCCBs, had faced severe cash crunch in view of the restrictions put on these banks by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI). The RBI had barred all the DCCBs from depositing or exchanging old currency notes and had consistently refused to allow the old currency notes in the bank’s lockers to be exchanged.
These banks had also faced severe cash crunch that had but crippled their functioning. While on paper, the Katraj Dairy had consistently transferred money at regular intervals, the crunch led to farmers being cash deprived. In view of cash crunch, Katraj Dairy had asked its member societies to open accounts in commercial banks to get better cash access. Both the Central and state governments had also asked the dairies to ensure more and more farmers come under the pall of the banking network. Ksheersagar had said that around 40 per cent of the dairy farmers in the district did not have bank accounts.
“We had instructed the primary societies to ensure that all the 50,000 farmers get bank accounts,” he said. Also, following demonetisation, around 400 societies have started using bank transfers to remit payment directly in the accounts of the farmers. “Other than the PDCCB, these societies have accounts with banks like Bank of Maharashtra, State Bank of India and other nationalised banks. These societies ensured their members also get accounts and they have started using bank transfers to pay members,” he said.
Such transfers have ensured timely payment to the farmers. The dairy sector now aims to have bank accounts for all the farmers and ensure 100 per cent payments through banks to them.
Source: IndianExpress
Link: http://indianexpress.com/article/cities/mumbai/mumbai-dairy-sector-warms-to-online-payments-4456360/