Removing "bottlenecks" in accessing credit capital for female-managed cooperatives

The capital of cooperatives is considered the "blood" for circulation as well as effective development and expansion of production and business. To remove the "bottlenecks" of capital for cooperatives managed by women, the Women's Union at all levels has made efforts to support cooperatives in accessing credit capital for economic development.

Difficulty accessing bank capital

Tai Hoan vermicelli cooperative in Bac Kan province produces goods to supply many domestic supermarkets and for export. With a production scale of 2.5 tons/day, the cooperative is in need of expanding its business and increasing its raw material purchases but is short of capital. "We are in dire need of a certain preferential capital source to be able to expand production, purchase raw materials from people, and reserve the best output for production" - Ms. Nguyen Thi Hoan, Director of Tai Hoan vermicelli cooperative shared.

However, according to Ms. Hoan, cooperatives find it difficult to access capital from commercial banks. Banks mainly lend capital to companies, while cooperatives are a collective economic model, have no collateral, and have difficulty repaying capital...

Tam Ngoc Cooperative ( Hanoi ), with most members being disabled, is currently cultivating more than 12 hectares of fruit trees, flowers, clean vegetables, but mainly medicinal plants. The work of growing medicinal plants and packaging tea products helps members have a stable income of an average of 4 million VND/person/month, depending on each person's ability.

Ms. Tran Thi Thuan - Director of Tam Ngoc Cooperative shared that all the capital the Cooperative invested in developing the medicinal chain and beauty industry was invested by the members themselves or borrowed from relatives. "The Cooperative has done procedures to borrow money from banks, but the process is very complicated and takes a lot of time. Besides, the field that the Cooperative invests in is agriculture, which is considered difficult to attract banks because of the high risk."

Tam Ngoc Cooperative, with most of its members being people with disabilities. Photo: Vietnam Academy of Agriculture presents newly imported medicinal banana varieties to Tam Ngoc Cooperative

Sharing about access to credit capital for the collective economic sector, Ms. Cao Xuan Thu Van - President of the Vietnam Cooperative Alliance said that one of the current difficulties of cooperatives is the capital problem. Survey data of over 300 cooperatives shows that up to 80% of cooperatives have to borrow from the non-policy market and the black credit system with high interest rates, short terms, mainly serving debt repayment and waiting for credit capital.

Women's Unions at all levels "get involved"

Recently, the Government has issued many mechanisms and policies to encourage women's participation in collective economic development and cooperative building, including the Project "Supporting cooperatives managed by women, creating jobs for female workers by 2030".

According to statistics from the Central Committee of the Vietnam Women's Union, the Project "Supporting cooperatives managed by women, creating jobs for female workers by 2030" has only been implemented for more than a year, but the Vietnam Women's Union at all levels has supported the establishment of 1,214 new cooperatives managed by women with over 20,000 members and 12,000 cooperative groups with over 32,000 members, of which over 70% are agricultural cooperatives producing and consuming safe products; the average income of members reaches over 5 million VND/person/month.

In particular, the Women's Union at all levels has stepped up support for women to access credit capital for economic development.

Recently, the Vietnam Women's Union and the Ministry of Planning and Investment also signed a Program of coordination on supporting women in starting businesses, developing businesses and developing the collective economy for the period 2024 - 2027.

Permanent Vice President of Hanoi Women's Union Nguyen Thi Thanh Huong said that in recent years, Hanoi Women's Union has coordinated with the Bank for Social Policies, the Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development and other banks to support capital for women to develop the economy, enhance economic power for women, thereby enhancing the position of women in the family and society, contributing to gender equality; at the same time, requiring the Women's Unions of districts and towns to step up propaganda and mobilization work so that members clearly understand the preferential policies of the bank; guide members to use capital for the right purpose to bring about economic efficiency, increase income, and improve life.

The representative of the Women's Union of Thanh Hoa City also said: One of the outstanding activities of the Women's Union at all levels in the province in recent times is to support the development of collective economy. The Women's Union of Thanh Hoa City said that through programs and projects, the Union always takes advantage of capital sources, promotes activities to improve quality and expand trust and credit sources from banks, microfinance organizations, TYM Fund... In addition, the Union at all levels has supported collective economic models of seedlings, agricultural materials, and transfer of technical advances, helping Cooperatives improve the quality and efficiency of operations.

For example, in more than 1 year of implementing the Project, the Women's Union of Phu Tho province has created conditions for 24 cooperatives and cooperative groups managed by women to borrow capital from the province's Cooperative Support Fund, with a total outstanding debt of 5.4 billion VND to date.

The Women's Union of Quang Nam province has advised on the implementation of the Project in conjunction with the implementation of criteria in the province's new rural construction. Accordingly, the Unions at all levels continue to promote credit entrustment activities with the Social Policy Bank, coordinate with the Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development - and other commercial banks in the province to find solutions to support cooperatives in accessing credit. The Women's Union of the province is also interested in providing knowledge, capacity, initiative, and agility of the cooperative leadership in mobilizing capital for production.

Research on credit products suitable for collective economy

To promote credit growth for the collective and cooperative economic sectors, the State Bank's Standing Deputy Governor Dao Minh Tu said: The State Bank will direct the research and implementation of credit products suitable to the characteristics of the collective and cooperative economic sectors, and strengthen connections to remove difficulties in borrowing capital. In addition, it will survey, evaluate, and summarize Decree No. 55/2015/ND-CP on credit policy for rural and agricultural development to propose amendments and supplements to regulations to facilitate increased access to credit for people, businesses, and cooperatives; continue to study and amend Circular No. 02/2023/TT-NHNN on restructuring debt repayment terms and maintaining debt groups for customers.

Source: https://phunuvietnam.vn/thao-go-diem-nghen-trong-tiep-can-von-tin-dung-cua-hop-tac-xa-do-nu-quan-ly-20241104120207081.htm