COOPERATIVES URGED TO VENTURE INTO AGROFOOD TO RAISE NATION’S PRODUCTION

BUTTERWORTH, April 10 (Bernama) -- The Malaysian Cooperatives Commission (SKM) is encouraging cooperatives nationwide to venture into agrofood, wholesale and retail sectors so that they can contribute to the country's production needs.

SKM deputy chief executive officer Datuk Amran Abd Kadir said it can also directly assist the government and offer cheap and reasonable prices for goods, especially in the food sector.

"Now SKM is focusing more on cooperatives that offer agrofood, we follow the current government policy because we want cooperatives to help offer and produce food products to rely less on foreign sources.

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"When cooperatives themselves produce food products, they can also increase their members' income while at the same time the prices offered are cheaper or reasonable to consumers, for example, some of our cooperatives are involved in the MADANI Sale and goods are 20 per cent cheaper than usual," he said.

He told reporters after the Penang Cooperative Movement 2025 Aidilfitri Reception at Anjung Mutiara here which was also attended by the state Agrotechnology, Food Security and Cooperative Development Committee chairman Fahmi Zainol.

Amran said SKM provided secured financing of up to RM3 million to cooperatives involved in the agrofood programme and asked cooperatives to take advantage of the credit facility to be used as working capital expenditure for the development of agrofood projects.

He said cooperatives that venture into agro-food projects can be part of the solution to the food supply issue because currently there are 16,307 cooperatives with 7.2 million members nationwide.

"If many cooperatives are involved in the agro-food sector, they will certainly be part of this food chain, in terms of supply and guaranteeing the country's food security," he said.

Meanwhile, Fahmi said that last year, cooperatives in Penang received grants amounting to RM860,000 and RM3.37 million in loans.

Therefore, he hopes that this year cooperatives in the state will receive more than RM1 million in grants from SKM so that more cooperatives are involved in agro-food because global socio-economic issues, tariffs and so on will affect regional food supply.

He said that there are 820 cooperatives with 175,186 members with shares and fees of RM263 million as well as assets worth RM1.1 billion in Penang.

-- BERNAMA