Interest rates on loans through SDF hiked to 7.5%

30 Mar 2012 Evaluate

The Food Ministry has decided to hike its interest rates on loans that it provides to sugar companies. The hike has come in as a response to the increase in interest rates by the Reserve Bank of India on 13 February.

The Food Ministry lends money to the sugar industry at subsidized rates through a fund called the Sugar Development Fund (SDF). Uptil now it has been charging an interest rate of 4% which will be hiked to 7.5% per annum with effect from February 14, 2012.The fund keeps its interest rates 2% below the RBI’s rate. The fund aims towards sugarcane development, modernisation, co-generation and ethanol projects.

The corpus of the Sugar Development Fund, now around Rs 850 crore-Rs 900 crore, is built through a special levy of central cess of Rs 24 per quintal of sugar production. So far in the current fiscal, the fund has disbursed around Rs 370 crore with 100 proposals still pending. This is way below the disbursement amount of Rs. 900 crore in the last fiscal. The sharp dip has come in due to the lesser number of proposals received for ethanol projects. Also the fund has been strapped for cash due to large disbursements done in the earlier two fiscals.

The increase in interest rates has seen a mixed reaction from the industry. Some factory owners feel that this will put additional pressure on them as they are already burdened with the arrears of payment to farmers. Others, however, are of the opinion that the increase will discourage the misuse of the soft loans.

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