Through FGD, Kemenkop UKM Wants To Net Public Aspirations For Cooperative Development And MSMEs

UMKM (Photo: dock. Antara)

JAKARTA - The Ministry of Cooperatives and SMEs (Kemenkop UKM) held a Focus Group Discussion (FGD), on Monday, May 22, 2023. The activity was held to gather views and capture public aspirations regarding the latest issues regarding the development of cooperatives and MSMEs (KUMKM).

"This is to be input material in the planning of programs and activities of the Ministry of Cooperatives and SMEs (KemenKopUKM), technocratic designs, and background studies for the writing of the draft Strategic Plan (Renstra) and the Draft RPJMN for 2025-2029 for Cooperatives and MSMEs," said Secretary of the Ministry of Cooperatives and SMEs (SesKemenKopUKM) Arif Rahman Hakim in a written statement in Jakarta, quoted Tuesday, May 23.

Arif said, in the National Medium Term Development Plan (RPJMN) for 2020-2024, his party targets to generally increase added value, employment, investment, export, and economic competitiveness through strengthening entrepreneurship, MSMEs, and cooperatives.

"(There are) several indicators that must be achieved until 2024, including the contribution of cooperatives to GDP of 5.5 percent. This was achieved through the LPDB-KUMKM revolving fund distribution program, the development of food cooperative business models, and the digitization of cooperatives," he said.

Then, the contribution of MSMEs to GDP by 65 percent was achieved through the construction of the Joint Production House or Factory Sharing, 40 percent for the procurement of government goods/services for MSMEs, to facilitation of PLUT-KUMKM as a means of consultation and assistance for inclusive businesses and other empowerment to MSMEs.

Next is the national entrepreneurship ratio of 3.95 percent and entrepreneurial growth of 4 percent. "This is achieved through the development of a business ecosystem for entrepreneurs, increasing entrepreneurial life capacity through business incubation, training and facilitation of business consultations, facilitating the expansion of access to financing for entrepreneurs through Entrepreneur Finance Festival (EFF) and Business Matching, to facilitating PLUT-KUMKM as an inclusive means of consulting and business assistance," said Arif.

Regarding the number of modern cooperatives developed as many as 500 units cumulatively, it can be achieved through commodity-based cooperative development programs/activities, training, and assistance in the context of strengthening institutions and governance of modern cooperatives, to digitizing cooperatives.

"Similarly, the proportion of MSMEs accessing credit for formal financial institutions is 30.8 percent, which is achieved through a program to strengthen financing facilitation and investment development for MSMEs in accessing credit, financing MSMEs through facilitation of access to People's Business Credit (KUR), and KUR Clusters," said Arif.

He added that in addition to activities that were directly aimed at achieving the RPJMN target, the KemenkopUKM also carried out priority activities that would continue until 2024, namely complete data collection of cooperatives and MSMEs with a cumulative target of 65.4 million KUMKM data.

Furthermore, there is a Joint Production House with a target of five locations in 2024, the development of Rumah Kemasan services with a target of 2024 as many as 10 units, the PLUT-KUMKM/New PLUT redesign of 63 PLUT-KUMKM (number of existing PLUT), the revitalization of the People's Market as many as five units, modern cooperatives with a target of 500 cooperatives until 2024, to extreme poverty alleviation with a target location of 514 districts/cities in 38 provinces.

"There is also the development of National Entrepreneurship with a target of 2024 the National Entrepreneurship Ratio of 3.95 percent and the entrepreneurial growth target of 4 percent," he said.

Furthermore, said Arif, in the development of cooperatives and MSMEs, KemenkopUKM has synergized with local governments and other central-level ministries/agencies.

"Through this FGD, I hope to get input from associations that oversee cooperatives and MSMEs so that they can be adapted into the policies that we have prepared. Hopefully, today's discussion can provide an overview of the situation of cooperatives and MSMEs in fact, so that the policies taken are right on target," he concluded.