On the second day of Inter-State Cooperative Investment Exhibition-2017, State Finance Minister Prakash Pant visited the event and enquired about the products which are being produced through cooperative committees. He said that there is tremendous scope in cooperative sector and that the ministry is doing commendable job to apprise the people about how one can bring prosperity through cooperation.
In seminar, Dehradun district cooperative bank limited chairman KS Rana said that cooperative institutions are facing severe threat from multi-national companies and multi national financial companies as well. As is known, the cooperative movement came into existence to save the farmers from the grip of local financers but now again the condition is being influenced by similar threat. For this he appealed people to form more and more cooperative committees to save themselves from unwanted threat in future. He also mentioned about the institutions which have grown through cooperatives while also exhorting the people to support such bodies.
Uttarakhand state cooperative bank chairman Dhan Singh Rawat said that to save the cooperative committees the authorities have been developing the committee as multi purpose committee and suggested that unemployed youth of mountainous regions should be provided financial help from cooperative banks. Uttarakhand cooperative committee registrar BM Mishra said that 20 per cent people are associated with cooperative and that the main motto of cooperatives is to rope in more and more people into it. Considering that one can check migration through cooperatives, one will need to introspect on why the committees have failed to provide benefit to the members. “We can collect and market our locally produce. We will have to make our committee financially independent,” he said.
Noted environmentalist Jagat Singh ‘Jungli’ apprised that state is providing eco service in excess of Rs 36000 crore. Through medicinal and aromatic plant the state can create employment opportunities for the youth. In the mountainous regions, the cooperative committee can do business of mineral water on the pattern of multinational companies.
During discussion other invited guests including RK Atri and Ajay Kumar Singh of Organic Indian Cooperative, New Delhi, NABARD DGP HK Sabalniya and cooperative management institution spokesman Ajay Sharma also expressed their views.