22 December 2010
Specialist agribusiness bank Rabobank will offer a range of measures to support clients in regions of Western Australia significantly impacted by severe drought conditions. The measures will also be extended to clients struggling with major damage caused by current flooding in the Carnarvon region.
Rabobank state manager for Western Australia Crawford Taylor said the bank’s primary focus was to work alongside clients significantly affected by these extreme weather-related conditions to help mitigate the impacts and ensure farmers were well positioned to rebuild their financial position when seasonal conditions improved.
Rabobank has called for affected clients who have concerns and have not yet spoken to the bank to contact their local manager or branch.
Measures the bank will offer in applicable circumstances include:
- deferral of scheduled loan payments
- waiving of break costs on early redemption of Farm Management Deposits
- waiving of establishment fees on loan increases necessary to assist in rebuilding operations and
- waiving of fees for equipment finance contract variations.
Mr Taylor said drought conditions over recent months in many parts of the state – including the central wheat belt – have had a significant impact on the state’s grain growers and other agricultural producers.
“The driest winter conditions on record were experienced across much of the Western Australian grain belt. In fact, for the south-western region, rainfall for the year-to-date is 42 per cent below its longer-term average, with many regions receiving less than a third of their average,” he said. “This has had devastating impact on yields and has left the state with one of its worst-performing wheat harvests in nearly three decades.”
In addition, Mr Taylor said, the same assistance measures would be extended to the bank’s clients significantly affected by flooding of the Gascoyne River in the Carnarvon region, following torrential rainfall over recent days.
He said fruit and vegetable crops had been destroyed and pastoralists had been received damage, including stock losses.
“It is still too early to estimate the full effect of the floods on agriculture in the region, however our staff have been making personal contact with the clients we have in these areas to work out how to support them through any difficulties,” he said.
Mr Taylor said as a specialist in agribusiness, Rabobank took a long-term outlook and was committed to supporting its clients wherever it could through periods of difficulty, such as major weather events.
“We will work on an individual case-by-case basis with clients to support them through problems resulting from these events,” he said.
“Rabobank’s All In One interest only loan product is also designed to give clients flexibility in times of reduced cash flow.”
Rabobank Australia & New Zealand is a part of the international Rabobank Group, the world’s leading specialist in food and agribusiness banking. Rabobank has more than 110 years’ experience providing customised banking and finance solutions to businesses involved in all aspects of food and agribusiness. Rabobank is structured as a cooperative and operates in 48 countries, servicing the needs of more than nine million clients worldwide through a network of more than 1600 offices and branches. Rabobank Australia & New Zealand is one of the region’s leading rural lenders and a significant provider of business and corporate banking and financial services to the food and agribusiness sector. The bank has 83 branches throughout Australia & New Zealand.
Media contacts:
Denise Shaw
Public Relations Manager
Rabobank Australia & New Zealand
Phone: +61 2 8115 2744 or +61 439 603 525
Email: denise.shaw@rabobank.com