All should join cooperatives, starting from the financing stage…Surabaya, East Java (ANTARA) - Cooperatives and Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) Minister Teten Masduki has asked micro, small, and medium enterprise (MSME) players to market their products collectively, rather than individually.
Collective efforts through cooperatives would enhance the curation process, especially in terms of setting the product quality standards and selecting products that are targeted to become the featured ones, he explained.
"We should not work in separate ways; we should work in a collective manner. All should join cooperatives, starting from the financing stage, and then consolidation. Otherwise, they (MSMEs) will lose to big business actors," the minister warned in Surabaya, East Java, on Wednesday.
He made the statement in response to some MSMEs working alone to market their products. According to the minister, MSMEs need a forum to help them connect with larger markets.
Larger markets will enable MSMEs to make progress and development that will, in turn, result in a higher worker absorption rate as well as an increase in income, the minister observed.
In this context, he said he believes that cooperatives have a crucial role to play in promoting products made by MSMEs. They can even buy MSME products before offering them to restaurants, hotels, and governmental agencies, he added.
"We will improve and curate the products and we will connect them with the markets. For instance, we can supply (the products) to the hotels in this city, then we can also use them to meet the needs of the government," the minister pointed out.
The presence of cooperatives would not only ease financing and marketing, but also help foster a sense of solidarity among MSMEs, thereby keeping competition fair and healthy.
"Cooperatives can elevate MSMEs from being individual businesses to becoming collective ones that will, in turn, strengthen their sense of solidarity and kinship," Masduki stated.
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Translator: Maria Cicilia, Tegar Nurfitra
Editor: Sri Haryati
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