Hirofumi Kurashige (second from left), head of the Japanese agricultural co-op group’s Fukuoka prefectural union, discusses agricultural co-ops reform with Chinese scholars at Qingdao Agricultural University on Tuesday, June 2.
Daisuke Matsumoto – Qingdao, China
Senior executives of the Japanese agricultural co-op group’s Fukuoka prefectural union agreed on Tuesday, June 2, to work with officials of Qingdao Agricultural University to further promote co-operative activities.
The union’s President Hirofumi Kurashige and Managing Director Kiminori Motomura met Professor Li Zhonghua of the university in Qingdao on the sidelines of the inaugural meeting of the international federation to promote sixth industrialization of agriculture. Qingdao Agricultural University is the only university in China which has a college of co-operatives. As officials engaged in co-operative activities and an academic involved in a research on such activities, they exchanged opinions on Japanese and Chinese legislative revisions concerning agricultural co-ops.
The number of farmers’ co-operatives in China, similar to primary JAs in Japan, increased after the Law on Professional Farmers’ Cooperatives was enacted in 2007. Chinese authorities are working on revising the law to enhance the co-operatives’ management by allowing them to offer comprehensive services including credit and mutual aid business and strengthening their auditing and guidance capabilities.
Referring to the JA group’s comprehensive services, Motomura said farm co-ops can offer farmers agricultural guidance because they are financially backed up by credit and mutual aid business. “We want to carry out agricultural co-ops reform in a true sense,” Motomura said, adding that the Japanese government’s reform is going in a direction totally opposite to that of China.
In response, Li said that in the eight years after the law came into effect in China, the weakness of agricultural co-ops lacking mutual aid business is becoming clear. He said more people are calling for the need to introduce a comprehensive package of services in agricultural co-ops like in Japan.
(June 3, 2015)