Economy

Hui urges cooperatives to foster more global alliances

By Yang Ning (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-09-04 09:37

BEIJING - Cooperatives from the Asia-Pacific region have an integral role to play in global economic integration and regional development, Vice-Premier Hui Liangyu said on Friday.

Hui made the remarks at the Ninth Meeting of the International Cooperative Alliance (ICA) - Asia Pacific Regional Assembly in Beijing. Over 300 representatives from cooperative organizations in 40 countries are attending the meeting.

Hui urged cooperatives in the Asia-Pacific region to promote sustainable innovation and intensify cooperation through exchanges with overseas cooperatives.

"Sustainable innovation is the soul of national progress, the everlasting drive for prosperity of a country as well as the vitality headspring of cooperative organizations," he said.

The Chinese government has attached great importance to the development of cooperatives. During the past three years, the government has invested nearly 2 billion yuan ($294 million) to support various activities of supply and marketing cooperatives.

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Li Chengyu, president of the All China Federation of Supply and Marketing Cooperatives, said globalization has provided favorable opportunities for development of cooperatives. "At the same time, cooperatives can help solve many of the imbalances arising from globalization," he said.

"Based on the concept of mutual assistance and unity, cooperatives can alleviate the imbalance between countries in terms of production, consumption as well as investment," he said.

According to Li, during the first half of this year, the gross sales of China's supply and marketing cooperatives amounted to 634 billion yuan, while profits surged to 3.88 billion yuan, a year-on-year growth of 21.87 percent and 16.1 percent.

Pauline Green, president of ICA, said the United Nations has declared 2012 as the International Year of Cooperatives and it would be an excellent opportunity for cooperatives to progress further.

"If we are going to succeed in our ambition to grow our global cooperative family, we need to strengthen our voice and presence in key centers of economic and political power like the US, the European Union, China, India and Brazil," she said.

The All China Federation of Supply and Marketing Cooperatives joined the ICA in February 1985, and has established more than 1,400 joint ventures and cooperative enterprises with overseas cooperatives in some 30 countries and regions around the world.