Agriculture Infrastructure Fund (AIF)

What is the Agriculture Infrastructure Fund?

Agriculture Infrastructure Fund (AIF) is a Central Sector financing facility of the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare, launched in 2020-21 with a corpus of Rs 1 lakh crore. AIF does not hand out cash. It makes bank credit for farm-gate and post-harvest infrastructure cheaper and safer by paying part of the interest and by covering the lender's credit guarantee fee.

According to the AIF portal run by the Department of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare, the fund provides 3% per annum interest subvention on term loans up to Rs 2 crore per project, with a cap of 9% on the lending rate. The subvention is available for a maximum of 7 years from the date of disbursement.

Key objectives

• Build cold storage, warehouses, silos, grading and sorting units, primary processing units and other post-harvest assets close to the farm gate.
• Cut post-harvest losses so that farmers are not forced into distress sales immediately after harvest.
• Let farmers and Farmer Producer Organisations capture value addition themselves instead of leaving it to intermediaries.
• Create rural employment through agri-infrastructure investment.

Main features

• 3% interest subvention on loans up to Rs 2 crore, for up to 7 years.
• Lending rate capped at 9% per annum on the subvented portion.
• Credit guarantee cover under CGTMSE for loans up to Rs 2 crore, with the guarantee fee paid by the Government of India.
• Repayment period of up to 7 years including a moratorium of 6 months to 2 years.
• Online single-window application at agriinfra.dac.gov.in, with the application routed automatically to the bank you select.
• A private-sector applicant may run up to 25 separate projects, each at a different location and each eligible for its own Rs 2 crore subvention.

The Union Cabinet approved a progressive expansion of AIF on 28 August 2024. That decision widened eligible activities to include viable projects for building community farming assets, brought integrated primary and secondary processing projects into the eligible list, allowed convergence with PM-KUSUM Component-A for solar integration, and extended credit guarantee cover for Farmer Producer Organisations through NABSanrakshan. Uptake has since grown sharply: as on 30 June 2025, the government reported that Rs 66,310 crore had been sanctioned for 1,13,419 projects, mobilising Rs 1,07,502 crore of total investment. Cold storage remains the single largest activity, with about 2,454 cold storage projects sanctioned for roughly Rs 8,258 crore.

Who is eligible for the Agriculture Infrastructure Fund?

You can apply if you are:

• An individual farmer or a group of farmers.
• A Farmer Producer Organisation (FPO) or an FPO federation.
• A Primary Agricultural Credit Society (PACS), marketing cooperative society, multipurpose cooperative society or a federation of such societies.
• A Self Help Group (SHG), an SHG federation, or a Joint Liability Group (JLG).
• An agri-entrepreneur or startup working in agriculture and allied activities.
• A central or state agency, or a local body, including public-private partnership projects sponsored by them.
• An Agriculture Produce Market Committee (APMC) setting up post-harvest infrastructure.

You cannot apply, or will not get the benefit; if:

• Your project is not on the AIF list of eligible activities. AIF funds post-harvest management infrastructure and community farming assets. It does not fund the purchase of agricultural land, pure trading operations, or working capital needs.
• You are seeking a working capital loan rather than a term loan for asset creation.
• Your bank rejects the loan at appraisal. AIF is a credit-linked scheme. The interest subvention exists only on a sanctioned bank loan, so a non-bankable proposal gets no benefit.
• You cannot submit a Detailed Project Report covering costs, means of finance and revenue projections.

A point that trips up many applicants: the Rs 2 crore ceiling is on the subvention-eligible loan amount, not on the project size. You may borrow more than Rs 2 crore, but the 3% interest subvention and the free credit guarantee apply only to the first Rs 2 crore.

What can you build with an AIF loan?

AIF covers two broad families of projects. The first is post-harvest management infrastructure; warehouses, silos, cold storage, cold chain and reefer logistics, pack houses, ripening chambers, assaying and grading units, sorting and packing lines, primary processing units, e-marketing platforms linked to physical infrastructure, and supply-chain services.

The second is community farming assets; organic input production, bio-stimulant units, smart and precision agriculture infrastructure, custom hiring centres, and supply-chain infrastructure for cluster-based farming.

Since the 28 August 2024 Cabinet decision, integrated primary and secondary processing projects are also eligible; the AIF portal FAQs record secondary processing integrated with primary processing as eligible from 29 August 2024.

AIF is designed to converge with other central schemes. The portal lists convergence with MIDH, PMFME, SMAM, GOBARdhan, PMKSY and PM-KUSUM, which means a single project can stack a capital subsidy from one scheme with the AIF interest subvention on the loan portion.

What documents are required for the Agriculture Infrastructure Fund?

How to apply for the Agriculture Infrastructure Fund

1. Go to the official single-window portal at agriinfra.dac.gov.in and click Beneficiary Registration.
2. Register using your mobile number and Aadhaar number, and verify the OTP sent to your mobile.
3. Select your beneficiary category: individual farmer, FPO, PACS, cooperative society, SHG, JLG, agri-entrepreneur, startup, state agency or local body.
4. Fill the online application with project details; activity type, location, total project cost, the loan amount you need, and the means of finance.
5. Upload the Detailed Project Report and the supporting documents. DPR templates and a scheme checklist are available on the portal.
6. Choose your lending institution from the list of banks and financial institutions that have signed a memorandum of understanding under AIF.
7. Submit the application. The Central Project Management Unit verifies it, after which the application moves automatically to the bank you selected.
8. The bank appraises the proposal and takes a decision on sanction. Track status through your login on the portal.

How much does the Agriculture Infrastructure Fund actually save you?

On a term loan of Rs 2 crore, the 3% interest subvention is worth up to Rs 6 lakh per year, and it is available for up to 7 years — a maximum benefit of roughly Rs 42 lakh in nominal terms over the life of the loan, assuming the full Rs 2 crore stays outstanding.

Two further savings sit alongside it. First, the 9% cap on the lending rate protects you if the bank's own rate rises above that level. Second, the CGTMSE guarantee fee for loans up to Rs 2 crore is paid by the government, which both removes a recurring cost and makes lenders willing to fund borrowers who cannot post heavy collateral.

What are the loan terms under AIF?

According to the AIF portal FAQs, the repayment period is up to 7 years, inclusive of a moratorium of 6 months to a maximum of 2 years. The moratorium is fixed by the lender based on when the project is expected to start generating revenue. A cold storage that becomes operational in a season gets a shorter moratorium than a processing unit with a long commissioning period.

Lending is done by scheduled commercial banks, regional rural banks, state cooperative banks, district central cooperative banks, small finance banks, NBFCs and NCDC channels that have signed a memorandum of understanding with the Department of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare.

Common reasons AIF applications are rejected or delayed

• Weak or incomplete Detailed Project Report: missing cost break-up, no revenue projections, or machinery specifications that do not match the quotations. This is the single largest cause of delay.
• Activity not on the eligible list, for example a proposal that is essentially trading or land purchase rather than infrastructure creation.
• Unclear title to the project site, no ownership record and no registered long-term lease.
• Bank appraisal failure, inadequate debt-service coverage, poor credit history, or no promoter contribution.
• Mismatch between portal data and bank records, name, PAN or entity details entered differently at the two stages.

Help and grievance redressal for AIF

• AIF helpline for applicants: 011-23604886, 011-23604887, 011-23604888 (Monday to Friday, office hours)
• Helpline for bank officials: 011-23604914
• Helpline for state officials: 011-23604884
• General support email: support.agriinfra@gov.in, the AIF Contact Us page states that requests are accepted and processed exclusively through this email address
• Claim-related queries: claim.agriinfra@gov.in
• State Project Management Unit contacts for several states are published on the AIF Contact Us page

Registration and application on agriinfra.dac.gov.in are free. No agent can charge you to "get your AIF loan sanctioned", sanction is a decision taken by your lending bank on the merits of your project report.