Kumasi, Nov.14, GNA - The Saint Peter's Co-operative Credit Union (SPCCU) in Kumasi, provided 8.1 billion cedis as loans to 1,146 women to facilitate their business, agricultural and provident purposes this year.

The figure represents 45 per cent increase in loans the union provided to its members and an improvement over last year's loans portfolio of about 4.6 billion cedis.

Mr. Johnson Peter Mensah, Manager of the union, disclosed this at the 35th annual general meeting of the union in Kumasi on Sunday. He said the union gave 239.8 million cedis as loans to 37 men for agricultural purposes and recorded a dividend of 1.1 billion cedis for the 2004-2005 financial year.

Mr. Mensah said by dint of hard work every aspect of the union's work had improved tremendously in respect of members' savings, shares, total assets and reserves even though management was yet to provide an official report before the end of the year. He said management of the union would intensify efforts to reduce loan delinquency to the required level of about five per cent since the current level of 8.5 per cent had resulted in low income to the Union. Mr. Mensah called on members to repay loans promptly to increase the liquidity levels of the union to enable it grant more loans to members.

Mr. Joseph Owusu Agyekum, Chairman of the Supervisory Committee of the Union, said the committee was liaising with the Board of Directors to evolve policies to forestall fraud and irregularities in the operations of the union.