EVALUATION OF THE SMALL FARMERS FUND IN THE AGRICULTURAL INITIATIVE IN IRAQ THROUGH THE COLLECTION EFFICIENCY OF LOANS FOR THE PERIOD 2009 – 2018

To evaluate and analyze the small farmers fund, one of the funds financed by the allocation of the Supreme Committee for the Agricultural Initiative, this fund finance the unconditioned plastic houses, beekeeping, field crops, winter and summer vegetable crops, protected tomato houses, olive trees services, planting of green silage by fixed sprinkler irrigation and to construct consulting offices. As the total number of loans granted to this fund reached nearly 481 billion dinars in all governorates, amounting to 38991 beneficiaries, constituting about 23% of the total loans disbursed during the study period, Baghdad governorate has 68.6 billion of total amounts of that fund and that consist 16.6% of it, then Anbar came in the second rank by 14.7% then Wasit came in the third rank by 12%, while Kirkuk came in the last. The study reached an analysis of the achievement ratios of the small farmers fund for the period 2009-2018 for all governorates, the provinces of Baghdad and Basra were highest share of this fund for the year 2009, while the lowest share for these year were for Mysan and Kirkuk. In 2010, Anbar has the highest share while Kirkuk was the lowest. In 2011-2012, the governorate of Baghdad ranked first, and the lowest were for Kirkuk governorate, in 2013, Anbar came to the first, the lowest was Kirkuk governorate, then Wasit governorate returned to first place with collection rates for 2014 and in 2015 Najaf was the first and for 2016 and 2017, the governorate of Baghdad came first. There is a clear decrease in the rates of late loan repayment in this fund because these loans are closely related to the guarantees that document the loans. Most of the guarantees of these loans are the bill only, whereby the amount of withdrawals loans of all kinds is proportional to the amount of the guarantee on the bill of exchange 40 million dinars. The study recommended the necessity of conducting a field survey of all the purposes that the small farmers fund.


INTRODUCTION
Today, Iraq faces an economy that suffers from a clear weakness in production and the local market.It is subjected to commodity dumping that is difficult to confront locally.The economy also suffers, in fact, from Distortions in the price structure, structural imbalances in the balance of trade and work force, a deficit in the public budget and a debt that shackles its movement towards progress(9).Achieving an economically acceptable rate of economic growth and bad security conditions that limit the attraction of foreign investment, the development and improvement of agriculture needs many requirements (15).The most important of which is agricultural intensification and mechanization in order to increase the production and productivity of the land area unit at the lowest costs while improving the quality of agricultural products or at least preserving them, so loans enabled farmers to implement agricultural operations, no matter how large their size within the specified time, as the implementation of most agricultural operations is governed by specific times depending on the agricultural seasons (14).The demand for labor increases in these seasons to exceed the available supply and constitute a real economic crisis and another development requirement is the use the best available natural resources such as soil, water, manpower, environmental factors, etc. farming credit is provide for all purpose production and developing (12).The neglect of its equipment leads to waste and a decrease in the amount of production and a weakness in its quality, so the small farmer needs financing to get more advanced technologies or to adopting new methods of work with the aim of organizing the circulation of agricultural products among the multiple stages in their preparation processes (17).It also has a prominent importance in increasing the quantities of agricultural production, especially in developing countries, including Iraq, in order to achieve advanced rates of self-sufficiency, it is important for the seasonality of agricultural production and its extreme sensitivity to the time element, so delaying the completion of these operations has significant negative effects on the quantity and quality of production, and it also has an effect in reducing crop losses due to the ease and speed of transporting agricultural products to distribution, manufacturing and storage centers as well and contributes to rationalizing the use of natural resources (16).The agricultural sector in Iraq suffers from decades of poor implementation of agricultural operations with its vegetable and animal derivatives and the use of traditional methods, which caused the deterioration of the local agricultural product in quantity and quality and the loss of large amounts of agricultural production during the harvest, transportation and distribution and the lack of agricultural machinery and equipment prevented the implementation of agricultural operations (10).The seasonality in its specific times, which caused a great loss to most agricultural producers and reduce individual and national income, and here came the role of the agricultural initiative of the Iraqi government through the Small -Scale Farmers Fund in supporting and financing farmers in all governorates.The role of the relationship between the lending and the farm is important with many farmer using small rural banks (11).Since early 2000, a number of organizations have developed innovative ways to finance the agricultural sector, including adapting to microfinance concepts to provide agricultural finance, developing banking practices (13).And above all must have a say in the nature of agriculture and product marketing methods before entering the field to ensure success in the market, many of these new methods show great promises to donors and many organizations that aspire to achieve maximum success profits, so they implement undefined strategies and scope, including Risk-taking, which is a key feature of agricultural production, as well as the ability to select its clients, with the need to evaluate a selection of successful government interventions among many third-world interventions and highlight successful experiences (23).The Iraqi government launched in August 2008 the agricultural initiative as a national trend to develop agricultural production in the country in an effort to support the reform of the agricultural reality to stop its deterioration (7).Set a ten-year time limit for Iraq to reach the stage of self-sufficiency and supported articulated projects and governing the Agricultural sector (4) .The word initiative means taking a specific action for correcting a faltering path, meaning that the initiative is an emergency (21).The initiative means taking proactive and rapid steps by the state to advance the reality of the agricultural sector with its various activities, plant wealth and livestock (3).By providing all the financial and technical allocations needed by this sector and depositing them in specialized funds for agricultural purposes for which these loans are granted (20).It is all financial services provided for different rural communities and for all levels of incomes and holdings, and is divided into two parts, partial rural finance and total rural finance, the partial targets rural groups according to their location, either the total includes all services provided to different classes, including rural district centers, and supports all activities produced in the rural community (5).The Small Farmers Fund is a specialized fund for peasants and farmers that grants loans to all farmers who practice the profession of agriculture or those who intend to practice it and have completed the eighteenth year of their age.It does not include life insurance coverage for up to 70 years (1).Agricultural loans by providing short, medium and long-term loans to finance the production of field crops, summer and winter vegetable crops, the establishment of air-conditioned and non-air-conditioned greenhouses, and the establishment of honey apiaries (2).Through the Agricultural Bank, which sought to advance the agricultural sector, both plant and animal, and the term of loans may reach Longterm up to 20 years (22).

MATERIALS AND METHODS 1-Loan Payback Rate Efficiency
It is expressed in proportion to the recovery of loans that have been recovered during a certain period and is usually the financial year of the lending institution and is calculated as follows (6).

2-Time classification of the arrears
It means the classification of the amounts due or late payment or collection of them to groups according to the duration of the delay time, and the ratio of each period or period of time to the total amounts of arrears is calculated, and calculated as the following (19).
Overdue amounts for a specific period =                 * 100

3-Repayment Index
The Repayment Index is a modern standard for measuring the efficiency of collection or repayment efficiency, it compares the real repayment situation with a situation where we assume a complete default, this indicator is suitable for arranging loans according to their repayment efficiency on a standard basis, and this indicator can be found through the following mathematical equation 1. ∑   =1 = The cumulative total of overdue amounts during the life of the loan, and it extends from one year to n years and represents the real status of the repayment.

∑ 𝑨
=  = The cumulative total of the amounts overdue during the life of the loan, and it extends from one year to n years and represents the real status of the payment.Assuming that the borrower did not pay any amounts due (8).

4-The ratio of arrears to the total outstanding loans.
This indicator is used to determine the ratio of late loans to total loans granted, as it gives a statement and an indicator of arrears ratios relative to the loans granted as a whole and calculated as follows (18).Amounts overdue for a given year =              *

Results and Discussion
The financial evaluation of the smallscale farmers Fund

1-Loan Payback rate Efficiency
Table 3 shows Loan Payback Rate Efficiency for the Small Farmers fund for the period 2009 -2018 in all governorates, where the averages for the mentioned period indicate that there is a general increase in the rates of late loan collection in all governorates, where the highest average in 2012 reached 108% and the lowest in 2009,2010 and 2013 with a value of 0, the decrease in the rates of late loan repayment in this fund is due to the fact that these loans are closely related to the guarantees that document the loans.The Agricultural Bank administration in collecting such loans to refrain from paying the farmers in the specified periods, prompting the bank's administration to take legal measures against borrowers in order to collect these loans.In

Conclusions
There is a decrease in the rates of late loan collection on the whole of all years and governorates for several reasons.The management of the Agricultural Cooperative Bank under the guidance of the High Committee of the Agricultural Initiative documents most of the loans of this fund in the amount of finance as collateral for the loan, which is a weak guarantee of legal bond, which led to the non-payment by borrowers to know in advance that the legal action against them is weak or undeterred, causing the low rates of some of the criteria studied.The increase in the amounts granted to this fund across the governorates and years has caused a decrease in the ratios of the index of late loans to the total loans that exist throughout the years of study.The index of collection is good in all governorates and for the duration of the years of study 2009-2018, which shows the success of these purposes and their economic feasibility, which enabled their owners to pay, where the highest average scoring in 2016 was 0.85, although those years witnessed security events that caused them to decrease in some other criteria.
Recommendations 1-The need to conduct a field survey of all the purposes of this fund to provide the decision makers about that.2-Review the guarantees adopted by the decision makers to document the loans of the Small Farmers Fund because some guarantees do not guarantee repayment within the specified time after the period of the period of the grant, which caused the decrease of some percentages of the criteria studied.3-It is necessary to focus on the governorates with high rates of rural poverty in directing the loans of this fund to them.4-Determining the type and percentage of projects to be financed for each governorate based on its agricultural pattern.5 -Continuing to follow up on the implementation and operation of the projects adopted by any lending policy, and the * 100 Repayment indicator during the life of the loan in t.

545 Table1. Number of beneficiaries and the Amounts Spent in the Small farmers Fund for the Period 2009-2018 ( M.I.D.)
Table 1 shows the number of beneficiaries and the amounts spent in the Small Farmers Fund for the Period 2009-2016.