YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 6, NOYAN TAPAN. About 250 processing enterprises and farms have become beneficiaries of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) and the World Bank (WB) financed credit programs on development of the Armenian agriculture. Processing enterprises make up 70% of the total number of the beneficiaries. Some enterprises engaged in cattle breeding and planting of new gardens have also received credits. Under these programs, vineyards of about 1,000 ha, including vineyards of 500 ha in Vayots Dzor marz, have been planted in Armenia. NT correspondent was informed about it by Ara Muradian, the director of the "Rural Financing Facility" programs implementation office - state institution of the RA ministry of finance and economy. According to him, the IFAD- and the WB-financed programs encourage the introduction of new technologies because it is necessary to use equipment, production processes and expert potential in line with European standards in order to enter European markets. The Rural Financing Facility was established in 2005 under the cooperation agreement signed between the Armenian government and the IFAD. The total cost of the agreement is 28 million dollars, 9.4 million dollars of which is envisaged for credit provision with the aim of economic development of rural areas. A. Muradian said that credits of nearly 6 million dollars were provided through 8 Armenian banks under the credit component of the IFAD's program in the period of February 2006 to October 2007. The program included all Armenian marzes, except for Yerevan and the adjacent marzes of Ararat, Armavir and Kotayk, which are considered as relatively prosperous by the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper. The amount of distributed resources exceeded by 2 million dollars the index envisaged by the plan-budget, which is explained by the previous absence of credit programs on the regions included in the program and by great demand for financial resources. A credit component of 5 million dollars is envisaged by the agreement signed between the Armenian government and the World Bank's International Development Agency (IDA) in 2006. In the words of A. Muradian, from the end of 2006 to late October 2007, about 2 million dollars of WB credit resources was distributed through 5 banks. This program includes the whole country, including Yerevan. A. Muradian explained that the fact that the WB program's financial resources are a bit more expensive than those of the IFAD program is conditioned by the inclusion of Yerevan and the adjacent marzes in the WB program: taking into account the "extra" interest rates of banks, the beneficiaries receive credits of the IFAD program at an annual interest of 10-12%, while credits of the WB program have an interest rate of 12-14%. A. Muradian said that the use of the mechanisms worked out by the Rural Financing Facility allows to reduce the loss of credit resources to zero. In his opinion, the highest appreciation of their work is that their office will coordinate the work under the credit component of the Millennium Challenge Armenia program. The office will provide this program's credits of 8.5 million dollars by using the mechanisms formed during the IFAD's and the WB's programs.

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