ADB to scale up global loan portfolio by 50% to shore up agric-business – MD

The Managing Director of Agricultural Development Bank (ADB) says the bank will this year till 2022 upscale its global loan by 50% and create a separate balance sheet for agric-business financing.

According to Dr John Mensah, the bank has started posting profits.

Speaking at the bank’s annual thanksgiving service in Accra, Dr Mensah stated the bank is currently well-capitalized in excess of over GH¢700 million which indicates bright prospects for the year 2020 and beyond.

"as of 2016, liquidity was an issue but now ADB is one of the most liquid banks and in the money market we have liquid funds floating about 1.8 billion. ADB has capitalization from shareholders and the bank of Ghana and GAT as a special purpose vehicle (SPV) and in our books, we have exceeded capital over GH¢700 million".

He added that "ADB is ready to deliver and we have reconstituted our structures to deliver to the more agric-business sector. We now have agric-business department broken down into crops, services and tree crop. We have encompassed the whole agric-business chain".

The board chairman of the bank Alex Bernasko in his remarks stated that in the past few years, the bank under his leadership has "posted profits in 2017, 2018 and 2019 is going to be better".

He further added that the bank will pursue programs to sustain the gains made and this will be guided by complying with Bank of Ghana’s policy directives.

"We hope by the end of 2020, the bank will be among the first five excelling banks in the country" he stated.

GAT takes 13% of ADB

The Ghana Amalgamated Trust Limited (GAT) now owns 13 per cent of the Agricultural Development Bank Limited (ADB).

It followed the successful injection of GH¢127 million into the agriculture-focused lender by GAT, a special purpose vehicle (SPV) that the government established in 2018 to help capitalise, restructure and boost growth in five undercapitalised but well-managed indigenous banks.

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