Japanese Consumers’ Cooperative Union has reported that 57 consumers’ cooperatives in 31 prefectures have signed an agreement with 396 municipalities by the end of July this year to watch over the safety of children and elderly people in local communities. The number of agreement increased 70% in the last four months, the union said.
As the staffs of consumers’ cooperatives regularly visit their members’ homes to deliver meals and commodities, many of the cooperatives engage in activities to confirm the safety of people, and the union hopes to further expand the activities for local communities by utilizing cooperatives’ home delivery services.
The first such agreement was signed in 2007 between the Kochi prefectural government and a consumers’ cooperative in Kochi. Starting in fiscal 2013, the union is encouraging its member cooperatives to strengthen safety confirmation activities, and the number of cooperatives engaging in such activities increased 40% in the April-July period, according to the union.
In Hokkaido, a consumers’ cooperative in Sapporo (Co-op Sapporo) signed an agreement with 62 municipalities in the region since April, doubling the number of agreements signed compared with fiscal 2012, with plans to increase the number further in the future. In Kanagawa Prefecture, 15 cooperatives signed an agreement with the prefectural government in June to conduct the activities throughout the prefecture.
The safety confirmation activities are producing good results, with many reported cases of cooperatives’ staffs helping local people, such as a co-op staff in Ibaraki Prefecture calling a hospital after finding that something was wrong with an elderly member, or a staff in Tottori Prefecture rescuing a man who fell into a rice paddy, according to the union.
(Aug. 13, 2013)