Coopbank Ethiopia and Rabo Partnerships Mark Milestone with First Digital Loan Disbursement
Utrecht, June 2025 - Recently Coopbank Ethiopia reached a major milestone in its digital transformation journey by disbursing its first digital agricultural loan to a smallholder farmer. This marks the beginning of a bold initiative to empower over 3 million farmers across Ethiopia through inclusive, technology-driven financial solutions. The first recipient is a 52-year-old woman farmer with three children, cultivating mainly barley, but also wheat, beans, chickpeas on a 1.25-hectare plot. This loan is more than just financial support; it’s a turning point. With access to high-quality seeds and fertilizer, she can significantly boost her barley yields. More importantly, her digitized farmer profile opens the door to a broader ecosystem of services, enabling her to professionalize her farming practices and access markets, advisory services, and insurances.
A Shared Vision for Inclusive Growth
This achievement is part of a broader ambition announced last year by Coopbank and Rabo Partnerships: to serve an additional 3 million farmers within three years. Coopbank, founded by farmers two decades ago, now serves nearly 15 million clients. With digital services, the bank is extending its reach to previously unbanked communities.
This first disbursement is just the beginning. In the coming weeks, Coopbank aims to provide digital loans to 5,000 farmers in the malt barley value chain across Arsi and West Arsi. Later this year, the program will expand to include coffee farmers, helping them offset income losses from stumping (a rejuvenation practice that can double coffee production and increase income).
Building the Digital Ecosystem
Together with Rabo Partnerships, Coopbank has implemented an integrated, end-to-end solution focused on digitizing the agricultural value chain. This includes:
• Farm Pass Platform (powered by Mastercard): Enables farmer profiling, produce aggregation, harvest forecasting, input and loan requests, and access to a digital marketplace.
• Alternative Credit Scoring: By combining Farm Pass data, transaction history, and remote sensing data the solution can automatically assess creditworthiness and approve small loans of USD 763.
• Digitized Loan Monitoring: Ensure scalable, data-driven, and inclusive financing, while also reducing the operational costs significantly.
To date, over 515,000 farmers have been onboarded, and transactions worth more than 460 million ETB have been digitized across key value chains including coffee, barley, wheat, and dairy.
A Movement Toward Sustainable Agriculture
“This first disbursement marks the beginning of a journey to reach millions,” said Esayas Yohannes, Area Lead Digital Agriculture at Coopbank. “It’s a testament that digital solutions are not just tools, but catalysts for transforming agriculture and access to finance at scale. Together with Rabo Partnerships, we are addressing long-standing barriers and developing a more inclusive, data-driven future for Ethiopia’s agricultural sector.”