The Reserve Bank on Friday extended the time period for credit facilities given to various sectors including exporters to help them tide over credit crunch and battle the economic slowdown.
In view of the difficulties being faced by exporters on account of the weakening of external demand, RBI decided to extend the period of concessional pre-shipment credit from 90 days to 180 days.
The facility would come into effect from 1st December, RBI release in Mumbai said on Friday.
At present, exporters receive concessional credit at 2.5 per cent below the benchmark prime lending rate (BPLR) for pre-shipment activities.
The decision was taken after a review meeting convened by RBI Governor D Subbarao with select public and private sector banks.
In addition, the RBI has also clarified that the refinance facility for the mutual funds, NBFCs and housing finance companies would be available "for renewal/rollover, on maturity of existing facility."
The apex bank has been providing liquidity support to the NBFCs HFCs and MFs through refinance route to help them tide over the credit crunch.
It further said the refinance facility under the Liquidity Adjustment Facility (LAF) has been extended to 30th June, 2009.
This facility helps the banks to borrow one per cent of the deposits at the repo rate from the central bank.
Besides, the Forex swap facility to the banks for meeting overseas funding requirement in dollars has been extended to 30th June.
Under this facility, the central bank provides forex liquidity to public and private sector banks through forex swap of tenors up to three months.
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