SA farmers: Are you eligible for the Farm Finance Concessional Loans Scheme?

Although farming offers the opportunity to turn a high profit, the industry is also ripe with risks and costly challenges. That's why it's important to ensure you have a comprehensive farm insurance scheme in place to protect your assets if you are negatively impacted by an unforeseen event such as a natural disaster or burglary.

Another way to strive for success in the industry is to make the most of government subsidiaries and aid. These are often introduced to ease financial and regulatory burdens for farmers and therefore improve productivity and proficiency.

Farmers in South Australia may be eligible for a Farm Finance Concessional Loan Scheme. This scheme is designed to help eligible farmers restructure their up to 50 per cent of their debt.

State Minister for Agriculture, Food and Fisheries Gail Gago said applications for the scheme opened on Friday December 20 2013. Ms Gago is encouraging local farmers to submit an application if they believe they could benefit from the financial aid.

"This scheme aims to assist farm businesses that are experiencing difficulty in servicing debt but have good long term prospects of returning to commercial viability," Ms Gago explained.

"The loans for debt restricting will help farmers get back on track and provides opportunity to improve their business debt servicing capacity."

Loans of between $200,000 and $650,000 for terms of up to five years are available for eligible applicants. A total of $25 million is available for loans of this kind in South Australia for this financial year, with another $25 million being added during the 2014-15 financial year.

"It is estimated that in the first year, funding will be available for 60-80 loans. Completed applications that include all mandatory information will be assessed in the order that they are received."

Applications close on March 31 2014.