Aug 21, 2014

• The document was signed between the Ministry of Agriculture, Cattle-raising and Food Supply, Embrapa, ABDE, CNA / Sennar, FEBRABAN and INFI

The Brazilian Development Bank (BNDES), the Ministry of Agriculture, Cattle-raising and Food Supply (MAPA), the Brazilian Agriculture and Cattle-raising Research Corporation (Embrapa), the Brazilian Federation of Banks (Febraban), the FEBRABAN Institute of Education (INFI), the Brazilian Association of Development Finance Institutions (ABDE) and the Brazilian Confederation of Agriculture and Cattle-raising (CNA), through the National Rural Education Service (SENAR), signed a technical cooperation agreement to help eligible projects obtain easier financing for low carbon agriculture.

The document was signed on August 20 at a ceremony at the BNDES’ headquarters in Rio de Janeiro, attended by the Bank’s president, Luciano Coutinho; Embrapa’s president, Maurício Lopes; Febraban’s president, Murilo Portugal Filho; and the president of the National Confederation of Agriculture (CNA), João Martins Júnior; as well as the MAPA Secretary for Agricultural Cooperatives Development, Caio Rocha; Deputy Secretary for Agricultural Policy and Environment Bureau for Economic Policy of the Ministry of Finance, John Rabelo Jr.; Vice President of ABDE, Rubens Rodrigues Filho; and the BNDES’ managing director, Guilherme Lacerda.

The agreement seeks to promote the creation of scripts to prepare technical projects in key technologies that can recive support in the Program to Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions in Agriculture (ABC Program) and to train professionals in the ranks of the BNDES’ financial onlenders to develop, analyze and classify corresponding projects, as well as agricultural and cattle-raising technicians that provide technical assistance to farmers.

The BNDES will coordinate efforts to be implemented under the agreement and provide the required financial resources to accredited financial agents in order to contract operations, within the established budget, in accordance with stipulations laid forth by the National Monetary Council (CMN). MAPA will work together with other signatories in the technical support events and promotion.

Training – Embrapa will prepare professionals appointed by SENAR as multipliers of technologies that may receive support from the ABC Program. These two institutions will be responsible for developing the script for each type of eligible project, which will include the microregion and the biome where the rural property is located. SENAR, in its turn, will promote courses, given by the multipliers trained by Embrapa, to prpare agricultural designers appointed by ABDE and FEBRABAN in the technologies that may be financed by the ABC program.

The multipliers will also give minister courses promoted by INFI and ABDE to train bank analysts from financial agents in areas such as analysis and classification of financing. ABDE and FEBRABAN will circulate the agreement among financial agents that represent them, seeking to decide which employees can be sent to training.

Entities and signatory agencies will be responsible for providing technical and HR support to enable the activities required under the Agreement, as well as disseminate it widely, cover the necessary expenses and appoint their representatives to carry out efforts. The agreement does not establish the right to transfer financial resources between participants.