Need for creating a good awareness about various schemes of the government in every nook and corner of the country for which cooperatives can be the best medium: Vasudha Mishra 

By Onkareshwar Pandey

New Delhi, Aug 23, 2019:

‘As many of the PSUs are going to be disinvested, it is high time that the cooperatives prepare themselves to convince the government to take over some of these PSU’s’ through some effective plans’, said  Ms Vasudha Mishra, Additional Secretary, Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare yesterday at the valedictory function of a  two-day workshop on ‘Enhancing Gender Equality for Cooperative Business’’ organized by ICA-AP and NCUI at Delhi from 20-22^nd August,2019.

The workshop was attended by members of ICA-AP Women Committee and other women representatives from cooperatives in Asia-Pacific Region, including Japan, Nepal, Iran, Philippines, Thailand, India, etc.

Ms Mishra elaborated that the time is ripe for cooperatives to make meaningful interventions as the public sector is facing a lot of pressure. She felt that the cooperative model which lays emphasis on sustainable and equitable growth has more relevance today.

She pointed out that the government is planning to come up with a policy to improve the functioning of the cooperative sector. She said that while there are schemes for the benefit of the farmers in the agriculture sector, the cooperatives do not have such schemes.

She said that the government as a priority will promote Farmers’ Producer organizations so as to double farmers’ income, which will provide a good opportunity for many of the cooperatives to float FPO’s.

She also emphasized on the need for creating a good awareness about various schemes of the government in every nook and corner of the country for which cooperatives can be the best medium.

Earlier, chairing during one of the sessions on boosting of the status of women at the work-place, she said that the government is considering to come up with a provision in Multi-State Cooperative Societies Amendment Bill for an internal complaint committee in cooperative organisations to prevent sexual harassment of women in the work-place.

Mr Bala Subramanian Iyer, Regional Director, ICA-AP speaking on the occasion said that we need to look upon cooperatives as a  start-up venture, and this should be widely popularized in schools, colleges, and universities. He said that ICA-AP has been committed to promoting gender equality in all the cooperatives of the Asia-Pacific region.

N. Satya Narayana, Chief Executive, NCUI speaking on the occasion said that promoting gender equality is very important for cooperatives for their contribution in doubling of farmers’ income by 2022. He also said that NCUI  Women Cooperative Education Field Projects have done quite well by promoting gender equality.

The session was moderated by Ms Nandini Azad, Chairperson, ICA-AP Women Committee. She said that ICA-AP  Committee on Women has taken for the first time a good initiative in collecting gender-disaggregated data considering that data collection and analysis has been a weak area in the functioning of cooperative organizations.

The workshop mainly recommended that women should be allowed to carve out their own destiny in cooperative organizations. Besides, each cooperative needs to have better institutions so as to tackle sexual harassment.

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(Onkareshwar Pandey is Editor in Chief & CEO, Indian Observer Post and former Senior Group Editor- Rashtriya Sahara (Hindi & Urdu) and also former Editor - News, ANI. http://bit.ly/2mh7hih)