Vietnam

At present, there are more than 20,000 registered cooperatives in Vietnam, but a great number among them does not operate efficiently. This is caused by the history of the country. Joining the cooperative used to be compulsory for all farmers in order to do farming. Accordingly, cooperatives in the past (the so-called old-type cooperatives) were organized by the State, based on the form of centrally-planned economy. In addition, the policies of forcible equal distribution also caused the members not to play an active role in the business activities of the cooperative where they belonged to.

The Cooperative Law enacted in 2012 marked a milestone of the cooperative system as all old-type cooperatives were required to reorganize into so-called new-type cooperatives. However, due to problems in the liquidation or merging of the less efficient cooperatives and the declining confidence of many social classes in the cooperative system, the above process is rather slow.

DGRV has been operating in Vietnam since the end of 1990s by providing support at all levels, from macro to meso and  micro scale. At macro level, DGRV has consulted the Vietnamese partners on developing and revising the cooperative law and various by-laws related to the model. Currently, the DGRV project, funded by the BMZ – German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, is working with the MPI – Ministry of Planning and Investment on a strategic plan for the sector in the phase of 2021-2030 with the vision until 2050.  It provides consultancy on a legal framework for the other partners such as the VCA – Vietnam Cooperative Alliance  and the MOF – Ministry of Finance to build up a cooperative audit system. Another topic is the collaboration with the VCA and the MARD- Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development to build up a suitable curricular training system for agricultural cooperatives.

Together with VCA and some provincial cooperative alliances – PCAs (DGRV is currently active in Thai Nguyen, Phu Tho, An Giang and Tra Vinh in the year of 2019-2020), DGRV will assist to increase the institution´s capacity by a wide range of training classes. DGRV and its partners strongly believe that only with professional and skilled staff, VCA and PCAs can become a reliable partner and supporter for cooperatives, representatives of the low-income class and rural areas in Vietnam. After all, the long-term overall goal of the project is to strengthen the corresponding social system that is able to support the sector in the future, especially when Vietnam implements plenty of Free-Trade agreements that have been signed recently.