Hatton National Bank the premier private sector commercial bank in Sri Lanka has been actively involved in rural development during the last four decades.  The bank has been in the forefront by providing financial services to the rural community covering a wide and extensive area focussing on agriculture, agri processing, animal husbandry, fisheries, trading & other self employment projects.

Over the years the bank has gained a wide exposure in serving the rural community and has gone beyond the normal engagement of providing financial assistance by finding markets for the products that are produced through the rural sector. To facilitate this process HNB has organized and conducted a number of trade fairs in the rural hamlets of Sri Lanka. In an era of information technology the bank has actively promoted the use of modern technology by way of linking the rural community to technically savvy organizations to improve the quality and standards of the products manufactured by them. 

The bank continues to promote a number of rural sector refinance and non-refinance credit lines and provides a comprehensive package of financial services for the development of the rural economy. The bank’s wide network of customer centres especially in the outstations have disbursed over Rs. 25 Billion in agri rural sector loans and the current outstanding is over Rs. 5 Billion.  To reinforce its commitment the bank has currently deployed more than 130 field officers including microfinance /agricultural experts to assist the rural sector banking operations.
 

As a part of its innovative initiatives to develop the rural economy in Sri Lanka HNB has selected two major corporate partners ie. M/s Chemical Industries (Colombo) PLC and Hayleys PLC who have established household names among communities in the rural sector to build and strengthen new linkages with these communities

This programme envisages that the corporate partners CIC PLC and Hayleys PLC will identify prospective farmers, entrepreneurs who are eligible to be linked with the company’s out grower network in sectors such as paddy, livestock, fisheries, fruit and vegetables etc, supply agri input and advisory services, assist in agro technologies and implement buy back agreements   with farmers to purchase their produce. The bank in turn will focus on providing financial assistance by promoting credit and drive the approach of building financial literacy, technical know-how among the rural farmer community through its branch managers, agricultural officers and micro finance officers serving in the rural areas.

To successfully implement this  corporate partnership  programme HNB, CIC and Hayleys will combine its expertise on  improving the living standards,knowledge and skills of rural farmers in agriculture, assist in improving the  primary and secondary education in rural areas, develop a strong out grower network for  agri produce,formulate an agricultural credit programme to facilitate the entrepreneurs, generate new employment opportunities in the agricultural sector and related fields, create  awareness for entrepreneurs to move towards new technology, techniques and market opportunities,provide opportunities to entrepreneurs to move from subsistence level to commercial level and improve the productivity in the agricultural and related sectors.The concept behind this initiative is to offer a comprehensive package of services including financial assistance, technical know-how & marketing arrangements for the rural community which will significantly contribute towards developing Sri Lanka’s rural agricultural economy with a greater focus on tapping the latent talent of the people in the country in developing our agri-based economy.