Agricultural potential of the Department of Cundinamarca (Colombia) for the microcredit sector

Abstract

The department of Cundinamarca (Colombia) provides supply for food needs in several departments and municipalities of Colombia; to fulfill this purpose, and in accordance with the national policy in which Colombia is projected to be one of the leading countries in biotechnological development in the agricultural sector by 2025, it is necessary to have infrastructure and innovative processes. For this reason, it is necessary to guarantee the sources of financing for the agricultural sector in this department. Some agricultural production sectors in Cundinamarca have no access to traditional banking services, despite their demands; therefore, it is necessary to have the services of non-traditional sources of financing to achieve their biotechnological development. Microfinance service providers do not have full information about the potential borrowers and their capacities.

This research aims to identify the agricultural sectors of the department of Cundinamarca that could be potential clients of non-traditional banking services (microcredit), establish the amount of credits, the value requested by each sector and the average per applicant, according to the identified potential sectors and needs. In the first stage, Finagro (Fondo para el Financiamiento del Sector Agropecuario) reports will be verified to determine the agricultural activities that, according to microcredit regulations, could have access to these services. In the second stage, the selected activities will be verified in the interior of the department of Cundinamarca, for which the respective municipalities will be identified. In this second stage, data from the Cundinamarca Government will be reviewed. In the third stage, the needs of the sectors will be identified.

It is concluded that the sectors that could benefit from non-traditional banking products in the department of Cundinamarca are the productive activities oriented to potato cultivation, with an average credit value per applicant of $ 26,235,053.75; sugar cane, average credit value per applicant of $ 12,386,686.4; avocado, average credit value per applicant $21,400,844.45; coffee, average credit value per applicant $13,298,374.4; cocoa, average credit value per applicant $26,046,026.06; and plantain, average credit value per applicant $11,406,038.14.