Farmers' debt to banks increased by 80% in one year, surpassing 590 billion lira

Republican People's Party (CHP) Niğde Deputy and Member of the Parliamentary Committee on Agriculture, Forestry, and Rural Affairs, Ömer Fethi Gürer, stated that farmers are going through a difficult period due to the wrong agricultural policies of the Justice and Development Party (AKP), and farmers are trying to get through the day by borrowing from banks.

Gürer provided information that the agricultural sector's credit debts to banks increased by 79.5% in 2023, reaching 590 billion lira, with an increase of 261 billion lira.

He also pointed out that 497.5 billion lira of the loans were from public banks, while 92.9 billion lira were from private banks. He further emphasized that while the sector's debt to public banks increased by 88.1% last year, its debt to private banks increased by 44%.

Gürer expressed that the problems in agriculture have seriously affected farmers. He said, "The increase in input costs has caused a significant bottleneck in both crop and livestock production. Representatives of the agricultural sector, struggling with dozens of problems such as the increase in the cost of feed, fuel, electricity used for agricultural purposes, feed, fertilizer, labor costs, and the inability of producers to sell their products at a fair price, have started to either move away from agriculture or borrow from banks. However, the political government, unable to see this problem, pursued agriculture policies based on imports instead of supporting its own farmers and producers. This situation has harmed both producers and consumers." (HA/PE)