Co-op way to cope with rising costs of living: Dr M
Published on: Sunday, September 22, 2019
By: Bernama
CYBERJAYA: Co-operative movement can play a major role in helping the low-income (B40) households in urban and rural areas to cope with rising costs of living, said Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad (pic).
He said the contribution of the co-operatives was not just to increase the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP), but must also be viewed from the aspect of increasing the purchasing power of the people towards achieving the shared prosperity vision.
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“In the context of co-operatives, the power in our hands is to fix the reasonable price according to the quality and consumption warranty,” he said when addressing 20,000 members of co-operative societies at the “Co-operative Direction After 100 Years” countdown programme, here, Saturday.
Citing Japan as an example, Dr Mahathir said the Japanese Consumer Co-operative Union (JCCU) is the national union of 320 consumer co-operatives with 29 million members.
He said the JCCU was not only controlling the market segment by supplying daily essential items, but also capable of offering a sustainable environment to the local communities.
As such, Dr Mahathir said he welcomed the implementation of Basic Necessities 100 (BA100) programme jointly organised by the Ministry of Entrepreneur Development, Malaysian Co-operative Societies Commission (SKM) and Angkatan Koperasi Kebangsaan Malaysia Bhd.
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The programme, which was approved by the Cabinet on Aug 29, is based on e-commerce, which will bring 3,000 retail co-operatives together in offering demand-driven supply of 100 basic necessities to the people across the country.
The Prime Minister also lauded the SKM’s new initiative to merge key co-operatives in the wholesale and retail sectors by establishing a secondary co-operative to be known as Wholesale and Retail Co-operative Union (Akrab).
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Akrab will function as a complement to co-operative linkages that will enable the co-operatives to dominate the entire effective distribution chain, especially in an effort to reduce prices of goods through bulk purchases and efficient distribution facilities, he said.
The initiative, he said, had to be strengthened and expanded through the e-Coop Trade Centre network which could reduce the role and involvement of the middlemen, while stabilising the prices of essential goods in the market.
With the strength of 14,237 co-operatives and 6.1 million members, Dr Mahathir said the co-operative movement in Malaysia should work together and venture into new areas and expand their existing activities to gain control of a wider segment of the market. In line with the National Entrepreneurship Policy 2030, the Prime Minister said co-operative was among the important entrepreneurship platforms for the country’s economic development.
“Co-operative is one of the social entrepreneurship models that do not aim solely at making profits, but more at benefiting and ensuring the wellbeing of its members and the community as a whole,” he said.
To that end, Dr Mahathir said co-operative movement needs to have a strong value chain system and a conducive ecosystem and this could be done if the co-operatives were directly involved in manufacturing, supplying and distributing logistics services.
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