BAKU, Azerbaijan, Dec. 2
By Zeyni Jafarov – Trend:
The microfinance market in Azerbaijan is currently going through hard times, as the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic puts pressure on these operations, leading to a decrease in demand for microloans and an increase in late payments, the Azerbaijani AccessBank told Trend.
“Microcredit operations in Azerbaijan are going through their second stagnation period after the 2015 devaluation. However, AccessBank, as a recognized innovator in microcredit, is taking significant steps to further improve the process,” said the bank.
“The main priority in the field of microfinance for entrepreneurs is the development of digital microcredit, which can be called the latest product. With its help, a client who has gained the confidence of the bank can receive a loan in a very short time. So, a short analysis is carried out by an employee of the credit department over a client who has appealed the bank's contact center, and after the approval of this request by the credit committee, the client contacts the nearest branch and carries out a loan,” the bank noted.
Touching upon the main directions of microlending, the bank noted that productive work with the Entrepreneurship Development Fund and the Agrarian Credit and Development Agency definitely contributes to the development of the main sector of microfinance relations, namely agriculture in Azerbaijan.
The bank's management actively supports the regions, as it sees a very strong prospect for the development of the agricultural sector in Azerbaijan.
“For the agricultural sector, we also have domestic agricultural products. We also actively cooperate with the Agrarian Credit and Development Agency to provide concessional lending. Moreover, we’re now actively working on stimulating non-cash turnover of SMEs and developing lending, within which we’re going to return in the agricultural sector to about 80-85 percent of the volume of loans issued in the previous year. A total of about 90 percent of all AccessBank loans are aimed at supporting the development of SMEs in Azerbaijan,” the AccessBank added.
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