The Vietnamese working delegation poses for a photo with representatives of JA Zennoh agricultural cooperative in Ibaraki province, Japan. (Photo: VNA)Tokyo (VNA) – President of the Vietnam Cooperative Alliance (VCA) NguyenNgoc Bao has asked Japan to help Vietnam develop multi-service cooperatives which have proved successfulin Japan.
Bao was on a working trip to Japan from November 4-10 during which he explored the Japanesemodel of multi-service cooperative.
Over the pastseven decades, cooperatives in Japan have expanded on a large scale. They havebeen operated based on the multi-service approach and competed fairly with each other following the market mechanism.
They arenon-profit organisations which cover a wide range of areas, from production,services, distribution to provision of financial services, such ascredit and insurance services, to their members.
Bao visited a purchasing and processing facility of theNational Federation of Agricultural Cooperative Association (ZEN-NOH) inIbaraki which has distributed 30 percent of the prefecture’s agricultural productsto the market. The ZEN-NOH is a member of the Japan Agricultural Cooperatives(JA) Group.
The facility purchases farm produce from local farmers tosupply to the market daily.
He said Japan’s cooperatives are effective because theyadopt their own regulations and are managed under the market mechanism withlittle support from the government. The model is applicable in Vietnam, henoted.
Bao added that the VCA has asked the Japan InternationalCooperation Agency (JICA) and the ZEN-NOH to send experts to share experiencewith Vietnamese agricultural cooperatives in accelerating reforms and operatingunder market mechanism.
Japan currently has over 600 agricultural cooperativeswith more than 8.6 million farmer households./.
VNA
