Crédit Agricole 140 years of history : 1910s - Serving the entire country

First, from 1910, the Crédit Agricole local banks were able to distribute individual long term loans to farmers, which enabled many of them to buy a house and improve their living environment.

The possibility of taking out a medium-term loan to equip and modernise farms, from 1913, supplemented the range of loans offered by Crédit Agricole.

However, the war disrupted this movement. Many farmers were called up, including many mutual shareholders and directors of Crédit Agricole. In a disorganised country, Crédit Agricole took several measures to enable farms to continue to operate. First of all, in the first few months, it facilitated the granting of advances to finance some farming operations, for example the grape harvest in Champagne.

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Secondly, since women were considered minors under the  supervision of their husbands and had no power to manage bank accounts, some regional banks allowed them to deposit and withdraw money and take out or repay loans. Crédit Agricole also created loans to local authorities for the restoration of derelict land for crop-growing.

But Crédit Agricole was also preparing for the future. In 1918, even before the end of the war, it set up preferential loans for disabled ex-servicemen and civilian casualties to enable them to buy a small family farm. The aim was the same: to combat rural depopulation by facilitating property ownership.