Sterling Bank and partners are targeting a $300 million investment pipeline from the Agriculture Summit Africa (ASA) 2026 to drive agricultural finance beyond farm production. The bank aims to attract financing into processing, logistics, storage, and other businesses capable of retaining more value within African economies. This initiative is an effort to address the deeper financing problem in the sector, which is converting production into commercially viable businesses, industrial capacity, and higher-value exports.
Sterling Bank's agricultural lending has climbed to ₦277 billion, representing 18 per cent of its loan book as of April 2026, up 30 per cent year-on-year. Despite the increase in agricultural credit, the sector continues to face a significant financing problem. The bank's Managing Director/Chief Executive, Mr. Abubakar Suleiman, emphasized that the next frontier of agricultural finance must be the part of the value chain where much of the economic value is currently lost.
Suleiman stressed that simply increasing the volume of agricultural credit would not be sufficient to transform the sector unless capital also followed the commodity beyond the farm gate. He cited cassava as a telling example, noting that Nigeria, the world's largest producer of cassava, accounts for only about two per cent of the global processed cassava market. This highlights the need for local processing to create a much wider economic chain.
Sterling Bank's experience provides a measure of how far agricultural financing has already moved. The bank said agriculture accounted for less than one per cent of its loan book when it began its deliberate push into the sector 14 years ago. By April 2026, the portfolio had risen to ₦277 billion, accounting for 18 per cent of total lending.
Over the 14-year period, Sterling Bank deployed over $500 million to support agricultural output in Nigeria. The financing supported businesses that generated over one million jobs and added over one million metric tonnes to national agricultural output, while more than 150,000 smallholder farmers and businesses were brought into the formal financial system.
Suleiman emphasized that higher farm output can increase agricultural GDP, but local processing creates a much wider economic chain—manufacturing activity, jobs, tax revenues, export earnings, and demand for transportation, energy, packaging, technology, and financial services. This offers a route out of the recurring contradiction in which African countries export relatively low-value commodities while importing higher-value products made from similar raw materials.
The Agriculture Summit Africa (ASA) 2026 aims to convert conversations into projects, projects into finance, finance into productive capacity, and productive capacity into affordable food. With the $300 million investment pipeline, Sterling Bank and partners hope to drive meaningful change in the agricultural sector and unlock the full potential of Africa's agricultural value chain.
Key points
- Sterling Bank targets $300m investment to drive agricultural finance beyond farm production.
- The bank's agricultural lending has climbed to ₦277 billion, representing 18 per cent of its loan book.
- Local processing of agricultural products can create a much wider economic chain, including manufacturing activity, jobs, and export earnings.
