The country's first "Digital Easy Loan" in the agricultural sector has been implemented, with Shanghai Rural Commercial Bank leveraging data assets to enhance creditworthiness and empower smart agriculture.

From: Xinhua Finance

Recently, Shanghai Rural Commercial Bank launched the country’s first “Digital Easy Loan” in the smart agriculture sector, providing 5 million yuan in credit to Jiqing Technology (Shanghai) Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as “Jiqing Technology”). This transaction uses data assets as a financing collateral, precisely addressing the “light assets and financing difficulties” faced by agricultural tech companies. It also implements the 2026 national “Data Element Value Release Year” initiative and promotes innovative practices of digital finance empowering the real economy.

In recent years, Shanghai Rural Commercial Bank has kept pace with the development of the regional digital economy and actively explored financial service innovations. Following the launch of a data asset financing special service plan in cooperation with the Shanghai Data Exchange in 2024—providing comprehensive financial services to data element companies registered with the exchange—the bank has leveraged its solid experience in serving the agriculture sector to extend the data asset financing model into modern agriculture, taking the lead in pilot projects.

Located in Jinshan District, Jiqing Technology is a national high-tech enterprise and a specialized, innovative, and new enterprise. It focuses on smart agriculture technology research and system integration. Its self-developed greenhouse environment precise control technology can increase productivity by more than three times compared to traditional greenhouses. However, the current situation of “having technology but lacking assets” makes it difficult for the company to secure traditional financing needed for R&D iterations.

After learning of Jiqing Technology’s financing needs, under the coordination of the Jinshan District government, Shanghai Rural Commercial Bank Jinshan Branch responded quickly. Relying on the core value of the company’s smart agriculture data assets and technological R&D, the bank fully followed through on key steps such as rights confirmation, registration, and evaluation, ensuring efficient implementation of the project.

The core data assets used for financing collateral are agricultural data collected via sensors, including vegetable greenhouse environment monitoring data and crop growth control parameters. After processing and integration, these data can precisely optimize agricultural production facility management, address technical pain points of traditional greenhouse cultivation, and possess significant economic value and industry empowerment potential. Focusing on key evaluation elements and control points of agricultural data assets, the bank collaborated with the Shanghai Data Exchange to conduct specialized research, promoting accurate and efficient assessment of agricultural data assets.

This nationwide first “Digital Easy Loan” in the agricultural sector is a significant achievement resulting from the collaboration among government, banks, enterprises, and the data exchange. It not only verifies the feasibility of the data asset collateral model in modern agriculture but also explores extending data element financialization across the entire agricultural industry chain. Furthermore, it further unblocks the value chain of “data turning into assets, assets into capital, and capital promoting development,” facilitating diversified growth of collateral assets.

Next, Shanghai Rural Commercial Bank will systematically summarize practical experience in data asset collateral in agriculture, deepen cooperation mechanisms with government departments and the data exchange, improve the data collateral risk control system and service processes, and promote the broader and deeper release of data element value. This will support the deep integration of the digital economy with the real economy. (Deng Kan)

Editor: Ge Jiaming

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