CREATION of the Department of Cooperatives will allow wider coverage of help provided by the cooperatives for its members, said Cooperative Development Authority (CDA) official.
CDA is urging President Rodrigo Duterte to certify House Bill (HB) 4174 or the creation of the Department of Cooperatives as an urgent and priority bill in order to address the major concerns of the country which are poverty, employment, food security, and environment degradation.
During the Kapehan sa Dabaw weekly press conference at SM City Davao on Monday, November 6, CDA Administrator Eulogio Castillo said they target to bring CDA at the Cabinet level to have someone focus on pushing for the solutions to the needs of the cooperatives and its members nationwide. Currently, there are about 25,610 cooperatives in the entire country with about 14 million total members.
Cooperativism member Fred Lumbia stressed that cooperatives are a big help in providing livelihood and employment to its members such as those who are former drug-dependents or those who had served years in prison since they would have a hard time looking for jobs.
Through cooperatives, they are given another chance and according to Lumbia, that is one of the biggest contribution that cooperatives provide for the employment sector in the country.
“What we propose is that CDA be transformed into a department. We will also start with CDA’s structure such as the budget, number of employees, and the network of offices…We already have a structure but converting it into a department we will widen the scope up to the level of the different provinces,” Castillo said.
Through this revision, Castillo said the existing CDA employees of more than 700 will be increased to more than 1,600 employees causing increase of personnel network. Aside from a wider reach, converting CDA into a department will also call for a bigger budget, which according to Castillo will cause more help to be provided and more beneficiaries to benefit.