Report on the Workshop on Strategy for Cooperative Development in Vietnam, Hanoi 1995

Abstract

Cooperatives in Vietnam since the start of Doi Moi in 1985 have struggled through very difficult times. Prior to adoption of Doi Moi and market economy, cooperatives were treated as a favoured child of the government. However, the government completely withdrew its support and interest in cooperatives overnight to the extent that not only all the financial and administrative support was stopped, but even a legal framework was not made available to them. While the legislation for private sector companies was enacted as early as 1991, till date cooperative law has not been enacted in Vietnam. Thus for a long time cooperatives became a non-legal entity facing all types of problem s regarding financing, business transactions, and other activities. The other problem was that for a common Vietnamese, cooperatives meant state agency and they have no concept of a genuine cooperative owned and managed by members. This ignorance was confined not only to common man but even at the senior level in the government as well as at intellectual level. The result was that a large section of cooperatives either became defunct or got converted into private companies.