Interest rate subsidies for select farm loans are under consideration as part of a wider review of farm finance schemes by the Australian government.Barnaby Joyce, the minister for agriculture, told the ABC yesterday that "I've got a pretty good idea what [farmers] are asking for, and what they're asking for, basically, in their heart of hearts, is they want interest rate subsidies back."Joe Hockey, the treasurer, in a separate ABC interview, said there was "a review of where agricultural funding is at."Hockey rebuffed as "not accurate" a report in The Australian on Monday that suggested Joyce was expecting a significant default on farm sector loans and was also backing plans for a dedicated rural bank.Joyce agreed with the treasurer. Speaking on ABC's Q&A last night, he said the comments reported in The Australian about the formation of a Rural Reconstruction and Development Bank were made by another speaker on a panel. Joyce said he was committed to progressing the cause of farmers in drought but he did not promise to push the idea of a development bank in cabinet. Joyce said: "The bank is more of a long-term issue to be considered in the white paper I am doing."Joyce said his parents got their start from the old Commonwealth Development BankEvidence in support of suggestions of a rural debt "crisis", a view also attributed to Joyce, is hard to find.National Australia Bank is usually regarded as the bank with the highest level of lending to agribusiness. This stood at A$47 billion at September 2013.Of this, $663 million was impaired and $130 million was 90 days or more past due.Support for the view that there is a crisis can be traced to an analysis by independent Queensland rural economist Ben Rees. In a submission to a Senate inquiry, on the private member's bill for a Rural Reconstruction and Development Bank, Rees wrote that the last five decades of agricultural policy "transformed a small farm, low income problem of the 1960s to become a modern crisis of low income, large farm debt."