Non-food credit grows 9.3% in December: RBI data

New Delhi: Banks' non-food credit growth accelerated to 9.3 per cent in December from 6.6 per cent in the same period of the last year, according to the latest data from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI).

Credit to agriculture and allied activities continued to perform well, registering a robust growth of 14.5 per cent in December 2021 as compared to 7.7 per cent in December 2020, according to the RBI's Sectoral Deployment of Bank Credit data for December 2021 released on Monday.

Growth in loans to industry improved noticeably to 7.6 per cent in December 2021 from 0.4 per cent.

Size-wise, credit to medium industries registered high double-digit growth of 86.5 per cent in December 2021 as compared with 17.1 per cent last year.

Growth in credit to micro and small industries accelerated to 20.5 per cent in December 2021 from 1.3 per cent a year ago. Credit to large industries recorded a growth of 1.3 per cent in December 2021 against a contraction of 0.5 per cent a year ago, the statement said.

Within the industry, growth in credit to all engineering, beverage & tobacco, chemicals & chemical products, infrastructure, leather & leather products, mining & quarrying, petroleum, coal product & nuclear fuels, rubber plastic & their products, textiles and wood & wood products accelerated in December 2021 as compared to the corresponding month of the previous year.

However, credit growth to basic metal & metal products, cement & cement products, construction, food processing, gems & jewellery, glass & glassware, paper & paper products and vehicles, vehicles parts & transport equipment decelerated in the reporting month, the data showed.

The growth in loans to the services sector accelerated to 10.8 per cent in December 2021 from eight per cent a year ago, mainly due to a significant improvement in credit growth to non-banking financial companies (NBFCs).

Credit to the personal loans segment continued to expand at a robust rate and grew 14.3 per cent in December 2021 as against 8.8 per cent a year ago. Housing remained the prime driver of overall growth in the segment, the data showed.