NERL sanctions Rs 2,000 cr loans against eNWRs

New Delhi: NERL, a subsidiary of agri-commodity bourse NCDEX, on Tuesday said it has facilitated loans worth more than Rs2,000 crore against electronic Negotiable Warehouse Receipts (eNWRs) since March 2018.

Of which, about Rs 87 crore loans have been disbursed against eNWR to accounts of farmer and farmer producer organisations (FPOs) on the NERL platform, it said in a statement. Warehouse receipts are made negotiable under the Warehouse (Development and Regulation) Act, 2007, and regulated by the Warehousing Development and Regulatory Authority (WDRA).

Warehouse receipts are issued in negotiable form, making them eligible as collateral for loans. According to the National E-Repository Limited (NERL), the first pledge was financed against eNWR in March 2018 and now the loan facilitated against e-warehousing receipts has crossed a new milestone of Rs 2,000 crore.

Commenting on the new milestone, NERL Managing Director and CEO Kedar Deshpande said: "This will pave the way to bring liquidity/finance and trade at a warehouse level." The ecosystem has the potential to enable the government to track the private stock available in the country and take informed decisions for market intervention, he added. Currently, NERL has over 6,600 client accounts and out of which 28 per cent comprise farmers/FPOs. Against a deposit of 36 lakh tonne of commodities, the company has issued over 4 lakh eNWRs so far.