Research Article

Demand-Supply Disparity: How to Design Smallholder Farmers-Friendly Microcredit?

A. K. M. Zahirul Haque
Palli Karma Sahayak Foundation (PKSF), Bangladesh
* Corresponding author
DOI icon 10.24018/ejbmr.2020.5.4.375

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Submitted 2020-06-18
Published 2020-08-31

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Article Main Content

Criticisms are aplenty that formal credit system such as microcredit is not inclusive to cater for the need of smallholder farmers. This paper analyses the existing literature to find out the limitation of microcredit to fulfil the need of smallholder farmers. The paper found that microcredit for smallholder farmers encompasses either ex ante flexibility or ex post flexibility. However, smallholder farmers need both ex ante and ex post flexibility due to their small, irregular and uncertain income. The current paper suggests that there is a need to revise existing microcredit modality by including both ex ante and ex post flexibility in order to make microcredit more inclusive for smallholder farmers.

Keywords: Smallholder farmer, microfinance, ex ante, ex post, flexibility

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