KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 27 (Bernama) -- Agrobank continues to provide financial relief to its customers especially its micro customers by accepting the application for financing repayment assistance until June 30, 2021.
 
As to date, Agrobank has approved over 9,000 repayment assistance applications in total and these comprise over 8,000 applications from its micro customers while another over 1,000 repayment assistance applications from its corporate, commercial, and consumer customers respectively, seeking additional financial support to ease their cash flow amid the COVID-19 outbreak.
 
This targeted repayment assistance initiative is in line with the recent Budget 2021 announcement made by the Finance Minister on the enhancement of the Targeted Repayment Assistance for the B40, M40 and SME customers.
 
Khadijah Iskandar, Covering President / Chief Executive Officer of Agrobank said,  based on the Budget 2021, Agriculture continues to be a very important economic component for the country with a total of RM1.7 billion allocation to empower the agriculture sector and food industry.
 
Most of the initiatives are carefully curated to benefit the agro community across all segments like small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and both the bottom 40% (B40) and the middle 40% (M40) income groups.
 
“Most of the budget announced for agriculture and food industries is focusing on business recovery of agro community particularly for those categorised under B40 and SME. Therefore, Agrobank welcomes our customers who require financial assistance to contact us to discuss and work out the most suitable repayment assistance package to address their current circumstances and also to them coping with the economic situation arising out of the COVID-19 pandemic.”
 
“As everyone is going through very challenging times, our immediate priority is to do what we can to provide as much support and flexibility to those who may be entering a period of financial uncertainty. This initiative is part of a broader programme of assistance that we hope will make our customer’s lives especially the B40 and M40 income groups a little easier during this challenging time.”
 
To qualify for the targeted repayment assistance, B40 individuals must be registered under the Bantuan Sara Hidup (BSH) or Bantuan Prihatin Rakyat (BPR) cash handout programmes, while M40 individuals must be registered under BPR and as for microenterprises, they must be an enterprise with approved financing facilities of up to RM150, 000, as defined by SME Corp Malaysia.
 
 “With this unprecedented pandemic affecting all walks of life, we would like to welcome all of our customers especially our micro-business customers to contact their respective branch officers or relationship managers to discuss possible solutions to overcome any financial challenges they may be facing. “
 
“The team at Agrobank will continue to stay highly responsive to their changing needs and will continue to provide repayment assistance and accept applications until June 2021.”
 
To be eligible for this initiative, B40 individuals and microenterprises are not required to submit any documents to Agrobank while M40 customers registered in the BPR database only need a self-declaration for their repayment assistance application.
 
Under this initiative, these groups may get a three-month deferment of monthly instalments or reduction of monthly instalments by up to 50% for six months.
 
Customers who require more information on Agrobank’s repayment assistance, may call the Contact Centre at 1300 88 2476 or email customer@agrobank.com.my, or call their respective relationship officers or branches, or visit www.agrobank.com.my
 
ABOUT AGROBANK

Agrobank is a leader in agriculture financing and values-based banking based (VBI)* in Malaysia. Established in 1969, Agrobank is actively involved in charting the growth and development of Malaysia’s agriculture industry by offering shariah compliant products and solutions across various customer segments including corporate, commercial, consumer, trade finance and micro financing customers. Agrobank is a full-fledged Islamic bank since 1st July 2015.
 
As a market driven, customer-centric DFI (Development Financial Institution) with a primary focus on strengthening the agriculture sector in Malaysia, Agrobank strikes an equal balance to its developmental and commercial roles to benefit the agriculture sector. Agrobank provides a comprehensive repertoire of financing solutions for the agriculture community; that includes upstream activities related to primary food and commodities-based agriculture activities to downstream activities such as processing, marketing and distribution of agricultural products.
 
Agrobank also offers retail banking financing solutions to improve the well-being of the agriculture community. This is done through its network of 192 customer touch points including 138 branches, 1 agro banking, 1 virtual banking, 10 commercial financing centre, 34 kiosk, 8 agro corners & agro point.  
 
In 2019, Agrobank celebrates its golden jubilee Anniversary, as it marks 50 years of its proud establishment developing the agro industry.  
 
www.agrobank.com.my

* VBI or value-based intermediation is an initiative by Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) which aims to improve the products and services offered by Islamic financial institutions towards a better facilitation of entrepreneurship, community well-being, sustainable environment and economic growth, without compromising on shareholders’ returns
  
Issued by Strategic Communications Department, Agrobank 

SOURCE: Agrobank

FOR MORE INFORMATION, PLEASE CONTACT: 
Name: Shahreen Rahim
Section Head of Public Relations 
Strategic Communications Department 
Agrobank
Tel: 03-2731 1660 (ext 1660) / +6012-943 6217
Email: shahreen.rahim@agrobank.com.my
 
Name: Syarifah Syameen
Senior Executive, Public Relations
Strategic Communications Department
Agrobank
Tel: 03-2731 1652 / +6012-310 1766 
Email: syameen@agrobank.com.my

--BERNAMA