Agricultural finance

Commercial bank lending to agriculture, hunting and forestry grew from TZS 498.0 billion at the end of 2010 to TZS 6,089.3 billion at the end of 2025, about US$2.49 billion, and to TZS 7,292.0 billion in June 2026, about US$2.78 billion¹²³. Lending changed little between 2015 and 2018, rose in 2019 and then held at TZS 1.6–1.8 trillion until 2021, while agriculture's share ranged between 5.7% and 9.7%, and from 2022 it rose faster than total lending, so that the share reached 13.2% at the end of 2025 and 13.7% in June 2026⁴⁵². The Bank of Tanzania reports annual growth of 38.4% in credit to agriculture in August 2026⁶. The supervisory data of all banks and financial institutions show a similar share of 13.2% in 2025⁷. The Bank's annual reports record agriculture as the activity with the fastest credit growth, at an average of 44.5% in 2022/23 and 37.6% in 2024/25, and attribute it partly to the special loan facility and reserve relief described below⁸⁹. Credit to agriculture grew by 29.8% in the fourth quarter of 2025¹⁰.

In dollar terms the stock fell from US$629 million in 2014 to US$426 million in 2018, as the shilling depreciated in 2015 and lending changed little, and rose to US$2.49 billion at the end of 2025 (own calculations)¹¹³. CRDB Group reported TZS 3,431.5 billion of gross loans to agriculture at the end of 2025, and CRDB Bank describes its own exposure of about TZS 3.1 trillion as around 45% of agricultural financing in Tanzania¹².

Smallholders rely on informal and cooperative credit. In 2019/20, 294,618 agricultural households borrowed for farming, receiving TZS 200.7 billion, and by number of borrowers family and friends (25.9%) and cooperatives (22.3%) were the most frequent sources, while banks supplied 34.6% of the value¹³. The Bank of Tanzania reports bank credit to smallholder farmers and fishers of TZS 467 billion in 97,273 accounts at the end of 2025, 1.0% of the banks' loan portfolio (own calculation)²⁰. The 961 licensed SACCOs on the Mainland held TZS 1.20 trillion of loans in 2024, and their sectoral breakdown is not published in readable form²³. The Peoples Bank of Zanzibar, owned by the Zanzibar government, held TZS 1,554.2 billion of net loans at the end of 2025 and does not publish lending to agriculture separately²⁴. FinScope 2017 found that 34% of adults earned more than half of their income from farming and that 58% of them used formal financial services²⁵.

Loan quality has improved. The non-performing loan ratio of the banking sector peaked at 11.9% at the end of 2017 and fell to 2.8% at the end of 2025 and 2.5% in August 2026¹⁵⁷¹⁷. The ratio was 2.9% in April and May 2026, against a tolerable threshold of 5%²⁶²⁷. The Bank of Tanzania does not publish a ratio for agricultural loans, although its Financial Stability Report of September 2016 named agriculture among the activities with higher non-performing loans⁷²⁸.

The Bank of Tanzania moved to an interest-rate-based monetary policy framework in January 2024 and set a Central Bank Rate of 5.5%, raised it to 6.0% in April 2024, cut it to 5.75% in July 2025 and raised it to 6.25% in July 2026, where it stayed in October 2026^3334351836. Lending rates have changed little. The overall lending rate on shilling loans was 15.05% in August 2026 against 14.92% in December 2010¹⁹. No lending rate for agriculture is published¹⁹.

On 27 July 2021 the Bank introduced a TZS 1.0 trillion special loan facility to banks at 3% for lending to the private sector at no more than 10%, and allowed banks to reduce their statutory minimum reserves by the amount of loans to agriculture at no more than 10%³⁷. In the third quarter of 2025 banks drew TZS 138 billion from the facility and TZS 4.1 billion of reserve relief for agricultural lending³⁸.

The Tanzania Agricultural Development Bank (TADB), a state-owned development finance institution set up in 2015 that began lending in 2016, held TZS 534.2 billion of loans and advances to customers and staff at the end of 2024, up from TZS 102.3 billion in 2019, and its share capital reached TZS 442.4 billion^21394041. The Minister of Finance reported in June 2025 that TADB had made direct loans of TZS 712.58 billion to 361,809 farmers, for a period that the speech does not state precisely⁴². TADB administers the Smallholder Credit Guarantee Scheme launched in February 2018, which covers part of the risk of partner banks' loans to smallholders⁴³. TADB reports that the scheme has guaranteed loans worth TZS 447.95 billion since 2018, including TZS 250.77 billion in 2024⁴⁴²¹. The mid-term evaluation of the financial inclusion framework reports TZS 117.65 billion of loans facilitated as at 31 December 2025, without stating whether this is a cumulative or an outstanding amount⁴⁵. The Agricultural Inputs Trust Fund (AGITF), established under an Act of 1994, lends to farmers, groups and cooperatives for inputs and equipment and issued 121 loans between 2020/21 and 2022/23⁴⁶⁴⁷⁴⁸. The 2024/25 budget allocated TZS 10.0 billion to AGITF lending⁴⁹.

Agricultural insurance is small. Gross written premiums for agriculture were TZS 7.83 billion in 2024, 0.82% of general insurance premiums, of which TZS 4.3 billion for index insurance, and claims settled reached TZS 2.05 billion²². Ten of the thirty general insurers wrote agricultural cover, and TIRA's outlook refers to scaling up a National Agriculture Insurance Scheme, and no launch date or coverage figures for that scheme were found in official sources by October 2026²². The Bank of Tanzania reports weather index insurance embedded in fertiliser and seed packages²⁰.

Financial inclusion has grown through mobile money. FinScope found 76% of adults formally included in 2023, against 65% in 2017, and Global Findex found 59.8% of adults with an account in 2024, while 4.9% borrowed from a formal institution⁷⁴⁷⁵. In Zanzibar formal inclusion rose from 45% in 2017 to 82% in 2023⁷⁶. Adults with records in the credit reference system rose from 2.75 million in 2023 to 8.89 million at the end of 2025⁴⁵. A Bill creating a collateral registry for movable property within the Bank of Tanzania was passed by Parliament on 31 August 2026, and no corresponding Act had been recorded in Parliament's register of Acts by 17 October 2026⁷⁷⁷⁸⁷⁹.