NMB, Tabora farmers’ unions in health insurance agreement
Prime Minister Kassim Majaliwa (right) presents a health insurance membership card to a tobacco farmer, Mr Atanas Gabriel from Urambo Farmers’ Cooperative Society during an event that was held in Tabora at the weekend. The event was part of commemorations to mark this year’s International Co-operative Day which was marked on July 3. PHOTO|THE CITIZEN CORREPONDENT
What you need to know:
- The bank has arleady set aside Sh5 billion for the programme, known as the Ushirika Afya Health Insurance Scheme.
Tabora. NMB Bank and the National Health Insurance Fund (NHIF) officially rolled out a joint scheme to finance farmers’ health-care needs at the weekend in an effort to boost productivity.
The bank has initially set aside Sh5 billion for the programme, known as the Ushirika Afya Health Insurance Scheme.
As part of the arrangements, NMB Bank signed agreements with two Tabora-based tobacco cooperative unions at the weekend in a development that allows members of the cooperative unions to qualify for the bank’s interest-free loans for health insurance membership. They are: the Western Zone Tobacco Growers Co-operative Union Limited (WETCU Limited) and the Mirambo Cooperative Union.
On Saturday, Prime Minister Kassim Majaliwa officially presented three beneficiaries of the scheme with NHIF health insurance cards during commemorations to mark this year’s International Cooperatives Day which was commemorated at national level in Tabora.
In his speech to mark the day before presenting the NMB financed NHIF cards, Premier Majaliwa thanked financial institutions for supporting the government’s efforts to make the cooperatives sector a robust economic front. “We in government are satisfied with the support financial institutions are giving cooperative unions. We have also persuaded banks to address the issue of interest rates which they are now working on with the Bank of Tanzania,” he noted.
NMB’s chief of retail banking, Mr Filbert Mponzi, said the bank plans to increase the Sh5 billion earmarked for lending to over 300,000 farmers across the country.
“This amount will be increased depending on demand for the service and how farmers respond to the health insurance loans’ scheme,” Mr Mponzi said.
He said that, apart from supporting productive farming, the bank was also investing in the Ushirika Afya initiative in an effort to support the government’s universal health insurance coverage aspiration.
“These loans are interest-free and farmers will repay them after harvesting and selling their produce,” he said.
The bank’s head for Agribusiness Retail Banking, Mr Issac Masusu, told journalists that NMB will issue the next batch of 90 Ushirika Afya cards this week in Kahama.
The Director General of NHIF, Mr Bernard Konga said the rollout of the initiative bedevilled by farmers’ fiscal constraints since its launch in 2018 has now been sorted out by NMB’s intervention.
The Executive Director of Tanzania Cooperatives Development Commission (TCDC), Dr Benson Ndiege, said such value adding interventions will entice many farmers to join cooperative unions and make the sector strong.
The District Commissioner of Urambo District, Mr Louis Bura, said without TCDC support and coordination, the new Ushirika Afya milestone would not have been possible.
