District Cooperatives Association of Kavre, the organizer, said the event is being held on the occasion of ´International Year of Cooperatives 2012´. Around 60 cooperatives from the districts have participated in the festival managed by Kavre Saving and Credit Cooperative.[break]
Mainly the cooperatives working in the field of savings and credit, milk, vegetables and fruits, agriculture, honey, chicken, health and multi-purpose have taken part in the festival.
The festival has 50 stalls showcasing foods, oranges, cut flowers, coffee, honey, chicken, milk products, shoes, toys, organic fertilizer and seeds among others. All these products are produced by the cooperatives themselves.
During the festival, Banepa Saving and Credit Cooperative is distributing environment friendly bags in order to replace the use of plastic bags. Aman Pote, chairman of the cooperative initiated the campaign by providing the environment friendly bag to Finance Minister Barsha Man Pun.
“We will be running the campaign in the market areas of Banepa as well in order to replace the use of plastic bags,” said Pote.
Speaking at the inauguration ceremony Minister Pun said that Ministry of Finance (MoF) has started monitoring the activities of cooperatives which are operating against the principle of cooperatives and are operating like banks.
“It is found that the number of cooperatives working against the preamble and principle of Cooperative Act are increasing. We will take strict action against those cooperatives,” said Minister Pun.
Pun said that the government has been promoting the cooperatives as it contributes to the economic development of the country. The cooperatives do not have the right to carry transaction worth millions and carry out transaction through good for payment cheque, said Pun.
In order to control the ill practice by the cooperatives, Nepal Rastra Bank (NRB) has decided to monitor cooperatives which carry out transaction of more than Rs 250 million. “We are regularly conducting meeting regarding the ways to monitor the cooperatives,” informed Pun.
Pun said that it is not good to blame all the cooperatives because of the ill practice by few of them. There are around 26,000 cooperatives in the country.
Pun informed that though the draft for ´National Cooperative Policy´ has already been prepared, it is yet to be endorsed. He assured that the policy will soon be approved so that cooperatives can be managed properly.
Pun informed that MoF has asked for Rs 2.5 billion from the government so that activities like cooperative training, promotion and skill development can be carried out.
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