The President of the South African National Apex Cooperative (SANACO) Mr Lawrence Bale says cooperatives in South Africa have benefited hugely from the 3rd BRICS cooperative meeting that ended in Cape Town today.
The country’s cooperatives umbrella body co-hosted the two-day meeting with the Department of Trade and Industry (the dti) at the International Convention Centre under the theme Partnerships for Development, Integration and Industrialisation Through Cooperatives.
“From the organisational point of view the country did it itself proud by hosting a successful meeting attended by delegates from all the five BRICS countries. Deliberations centred on critical and strategic issues that affect cooperatives in these countries.
Top of the list was promoting trade, investment and collaboration amongst cooperatives in the BRICS countries. We also intensely discussed and reached consensus on issues related to collaboration on capacity building and ensuring that cooperatives are sustainable,” said Mr Bale.
He identified the two Memoranda of Understanding (MoUs) that SANACO signed with cooperatives umbrella bodies from China yesterday, and India today as some of the positive and commendable outcomes of the meeting. The three organisations committed to ensuring that there were trade, investment and capacity-building initiatives amongst cooperatives in the three countries.
“The beneficiaries of all the work done and resolutions taken at the Meeting will be cooperatives themselves. One of the important things that we learnt from participating in this Meeting is that there is still a lot of work that still needs to be done in South Africa when it comes to cooperative development. Cooperatives in other countries are far advanced compared to ours. They are contributing immensely in creating employment for citizens in their countries,” said Mr Bale.
The Deputy Director-General of Broadening Participation at the dti, Mr Sipho Zikode said he was optimistic that the resolutions of the summit would lead to opening of markets for cooperatives in the BRICS and lead to sustainable trade amongst them.
The meeting was a success and was an eye-opener for our cooperatives. In my opinion, the South African cooperatives benefitted more than those from other countries. We learnt that cooperatives in these countries are highly developed and are operating at the high end of the value chain in various sectors. They contribute significantly to their Gross Domestic Products of their countries, while ours are still at an entry, SMME and micro levels.
The deliberations that have taken place on aspects such as skills transfer, capacity building and Infrastructure development will go a long way in improving the development of cooperatives in various countries, said Zikode
Enquiries:
Sidwell Medupe, departmental spokesperson
Tel: 012 394 1650
Cell : 079 492 1774
E-mail: MSMedupe@thedti.gov.za
Follow us on Twitter: @the_dti
Thulane Mabuza, SANACO Secretary General
Tel: 012 323 5069 / 5073
Cell : 082 677 2146
E-mail: mabuza.thulane@gmail.com
