Impact of Policies on Development of Cooperatives

Impact of Policies on Development of Cooperatives

 Introduction and objective: The study was carried out to analyse the policy impact in the development of cooperative societies in Nepal. Policy is a principle or protocol, which guides to right decisions and achieve rational outcomes. Cooperatives are businesses owned and controlled by the people who use them. Cooperatives differ from other businesses because they are member owned and operate for the benefit of members, rather than earn profits for investors. Co-operative is a form of business enterprises, or community organization, incorporated in service to its members and users, in order to meet their common economic, social and cultural needs and aspirations. Co-operative is jointly-owned and democratically controlled by its members and users on the basis of one member, one vote.

       The history of cooperatives development is so longer in Nepal. It was nineteen fifties after the end of Rana regime and establishment of democracy in Nepal, the co-operative movement started. Formally, in Nepal the concept of co-operative started in 1956 AD. The cooperative credit societies were the first institutional sources of supplying credit to the farmers in Nepal. From the government level of Nepal, the policy level body: cooperative department was first established under the Ministry of Planning Development and Agriculture in 1953 AD. The first co-operative act of Nepal was issued in 1959 AD. However, the political change in 1960 AD did not feel the need of cooperatives. It took longer time to regain the essence of it. After the restoration of democracy in Nepal, with the implementation of the Cooperative Act 1992, it has got shaped come into organization, even though it is not well structured till now.

Methodology: The research was based on the pragmatic philosophy having with concurrent mixed methods (qualitative and quantitative). Conceptual framework was developed based on issue-base analysis. This study was cross sectional. Besides that it was descriptive and exploratory research design. It had adopted purposive sampling. Sample size for survey was 248 (226 members of cooperatives and 22 officials), 5 in-depth interview and focus group studies. The study was carried out from September 2011 to July 2016. Frequencies and percentage were used to find out the prevalence rate of data. Besides that, manual interpretation was done for qualitative information collected from the in-depth interview.

Results: In total, out of 226 respondents, only 73 (32.3%) members, who got members' education, 67.7% are not educated by their cooperatives. In the case of knowledge of insurance in their business, out of 226 respondents, only 9 (4%) had utilized facility of insurance service. From the key informants' opinions, it was found that political changes directly influence development of cooperatives. Panchayat system in Nepal was one of the main political constrains in the development of cooperatives in Nepal. Next, instable governments in later 24 years is another problem to shape the cooperative policy in proper way. The result also found that failure or inactiveness of cooperatives in Nepal were lack of market survey, brain-drain, not properly participated female members in participation and decision level, etc. In the case of female participation, the result showed that out of 226 respondents (members of cooperative societies) only 73 (32.3% were female and 153 (67.7%) were male members although more than half of the population is female. In the governance of cooperatives, chairperson of board of directors plays vital role. However, the result showed that 68.2% of chairpersons from study area were found same for many years.

Conclusion: The implementation of cooperative policies was found very weak. Lack of monitoring, the cooperatives are not following its principles properly. As a result it was found that only 32.3% of members of cooperatives from the study area have got members' education. Lack of training and education towards their business only 4% members who were found using insurance service. There were 28.4% members, who got training from their respective cooperative societies. It was also found that political instability is another main cause of hindrance on the development of cooperatives in Nepal. There are flaws of cooperative policies because of which every year many cooperative societies are becoming failure or inactive. Lack of monitoring, there is found vast gap of gender roles in cooperatives in Nepal. The result showed that out of 226 respondents (members of cooperative societies) only 73 (32.3% were female and 153 (67.7%) were male members from the study area. In total, out of 213 members 51(23.94%) female members were getting chance in board of directors. On the other hand, 162 (76.04%) male members were holding the leadership. It showed too much gap of gender participation in leadership. Similarly, Out of 3942 members who were present in the AGM, 2536 (64.33%) were male and 1406 (35.67%) were female. Out of 75 employs, 62 (82.67%) were male and only 13 (17.33%) were female. In the case of governance of cooperatives, out of 22 cooperatives, 15 (68.2%) had same chairperson for continuously six years. 6 (27.3%) had two and only 1(4.5%) had three chairpersons. Thus, further study is needed to find out the impact of policy on development of cooperatives. As well, study must have coverage of whole country.