Hanoi (VNA) ♊– If farmers do not connect with each other in the forming of cooperatives and with businesses, they will fail to deal with big opportunities and challenges, President of the Vietnam Fatherland Front Central Committee (VFFCC) Nguyen Thien Nhan has said.

Opportunities and competition pressure in the economy have never been so observable like they are at present. They are strongly affecting over 60 percent of Vietnam’s population who work in agriculture and related activities, the Politburo member said at a meeting on June 3. Vietnam has also been influenced by natural disasters such as drought in central, south central coast, Central Highlands and Mekong Delta provinces. Long-term challenges from international integration and repeatable short-term challenges of climate change have made domestic agriculture vulnerable. From now to 2020, the best measure for agricultural restructuring is to connect separate farmers through cooperatives and with businesses, Nhan emphasised. The meeting in Hanoi reviewed the one-year implementation of the Prime Minister’s Directive 19/CT-TTg on stepping up the enforcement of the Law on Cooperatives. The VFFCC reported that the law implementation has gradually improved managerial agencies and organisations’ awareness of the collective economic sector. There are now some 20,000 cooperatives, 150,000 cooperative groups, 50 unions of cooperatives, 1,148 people’s credit funds, and 43 cooperative development support funds. Cooperatives’ activities have substantially helped alleviate poverty and ensure political security and social order, it added. The VFFCC also acknowledged shortcomings in carrying out the directive. The shortage of support policies has not helped the expansion of collective economic activities, and most members of cooperatives are not young and so are not generally good at accessing the market.-VNA