The Red And White Village Cooperative Potentially Develops Regional Superior Commodities

The Ministry of Cooperatives (Kemenkop) continues to move quickly in the context of establishing 70,000 Red and White Village Cooperatives (Kop Des) as an effort to strengthen the village economy and resolve various problems that occur in rural areas.

The potential that exists in each village is based on the main source of income as a large population, which is still dominated by the agricultural, forestry and fishery sectors which are in 66,002 villages.

"So that many local leading commodities have the potential to be developed by villages through cooperatives such as the livestock, fisheries, agriculture and tourism sectors that can activate the regional economy," said Secretary of the Ministry of Cooperatives Ahmad Zabadi in a statement to the media, Monday, March 10.

He emphasized that each region or village must have local commodities that have or will be identified as the attraction of the village. Development and scale of superior commodity businesses in the village will be faster and bigger if consolidated and do not run independently, therefore cooperatives are present to be able to consolidate superior commodities as a series of businesses with the community.

Through Kop Des, the government is optimistic that it can build a economic node starting from the village. This is believed to be able to reduce the extreme poverty rate that occurs in rural areas," continued Zabadi.

Zabadi added that the Red and White Village Cooperative will be a driving force for the village economy by managing basic food outlets, low-cost drug outlets (village outlets), cooperative office outlets, cooperative Saving and Loan Business Unit outlets (Kop Bank embryos), village clinicalules, cold storage outlets, and logistics distribution.

"In the formation of Kop Des Merah Putih, of course the Kemenkop cannot run alone, it is necessary to support synergy and collaboration from K/L as well as local governments and involve the younger generation to operate," said Zabadi.

Through coordination with the local government, the Ministry of Cooperatives will map cooperatives and village potentials, prepare cooperative modules and socialize, then provide institutional assistance.

Seskemenkop said that there are three model schemes that will be implemented in the formation of 70,000 Kop Des Merah Putih, namely first building a new cooperative for villages that do not yet have or have rural cooperatives, secondly developing existing cooperatives by developing institutions and active cooperative business units that already exist in the village.

"Finally, the revitalization of cooperatives through the revitalization of cooperatives in villages that are no longer active," he said.