Definition (1):
Agricultural Banks are primarily meant for financing agriculture and rural development activities.
It also, in addition to their normal specialized financial activities, do many activities of the commercial banks.
Definition (2):
A kind of bank lending money to farmers or cultivators for longer time periods and charging them lower interest rates than other kinds of banks.
Definition (3):
“An Agricultural Bank (Land Bank) is a credit bank specifically established to assist agricultural development, particularly by granting loans for longer periods than is usual with commercial banks.”
Generally, these banks provide the following products and services:
- Savings and Time Deposits ( also called CDs)
- Loans
- Checking Accounts
- Cash Management Services
- Online Banking
- Remote Deposit Services
- Debit Card
- Mobile Banking
- Bill pay
- Secure Email
Agricultural Banks finance all kinds of agricultural functions. The main financing sectors are:
- Crop production
- Livestock
- Fishery
- Poultry
- Agro-machinery
- Agro-processing
- Transportation, marketing, import, and export of agro-products and machinery
- Cottage industry
- Horticulture and Nursery
- Minor irrigation facilities
- Building cold storages
- Building warehouses
- Rice and wheat milling
- Shrimp storage and processing
- Marketing of agricultural and fishery products
- Self-employment of unemployed and under-employed educated youth, males, females, and landless in rural areas.