Case Study

Warehouse Receipts Turn Corn into Collateral: Uganda

USAID-funded program in Uganda gives farmers access to bank loans and higher crop prices
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The note details USAID's "Rural Saving Promotion and Enhancement of Enterprise Development"(Rural SPEED) project as follows:

  • It is an innovative warehouse receipt system;
  • It lets the farmers store their crop, use it as collateral for a loan worth 80% of the current grain value, and sell later at a higher price when prices increase;
  • It helps Ugandan farmers overcome the following two challenges that kept them at the subsistence level:
    • The cyclical nature of farm income,
    • The lack of access to credit;
  • Chemonics International developed the system and implemented it along with the following partners:
    • The Khapchorwa Commercial Farmers' Association (KACOFA) that has 2,100 members,
    • Stanbic Bank.

The note lists the following areas of success of the project:

  • It has boosted incomes and created new opportunities;
  • The amount of grain that the farmers are delivering to the warehouse has dramatically exceeded expectations.

The note concludes that the success of Rural SPEED has presented an easily replicable model that can be expanded to cover other crops in various parts of the country.

About this Publication

By Kristalsky, T.
Published