Kathmandu, August 20:

Agricultural Development Bank Ltd (ADBL) and the Centre for International Cooperation of Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MASHAV) signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) here today for mutual cooperation to enhance institutional efficiency and human resources for rendering banking services to rural people and entrepreneurs to reduce poverty, provide modern banking services and ensure financial viability of ADBL.

Israel’s envoy to Nepal Dan Stav and ADBL general manager Yogendra Pant signed the three-year agreement on behalf of their respective institutions. Pant said a delegation from Israel would come to Nepal and hold training and impart skills to local agents who would then train farmers and help them become agro-pioneers of the country.

“The programme will boost the farming sector and encourage farmers to take up new technology farming,” Pant said adding that ADBL plans to run the programme that will start soon after Dashain for three years.

Envoy Stav said, “This sort of training will be useful in promoting bilateral relationships. Via these programmes, we can share our experiences in the concerned field with the people here. Nepali farming is traditional and it needs modernisation to create more job opportunities because 81 per cent of the people are engaged in this sector.”

“Agriculture here should also become business-oriented. For this, farmers need to have finance and loan facility through banks. Without the investment involvement of banks in this sector, the mechanism for development of agriculture cannot succeed,” Stav said.