Profits in the collective economic sector and cooperatives are still low.

Sharing the report of the Ministry of Finance at the National Cooperative Forum 2025 with the theme "Transforming green production for sustainable development", on the morning of April 11, Mr. Bui Anh Tuan - Director of the Department of Private Enterprise Development and Collective Economy (Ministry of Finance) said that the collective economic sector has had positive changes in recent times.

The number of newly established cooperatives and cooperative unions has increased significantly, becoming more diversified in terms of industry, scale and level, providing better support to members, creating jobs and increasing regular income for workers. Cooperatives have invested in machinery, converted to clean production technology and developed environmentally friendly products, helping to protect natural resources and reduce pollution.

However, in addition to the achievements of the collective economic sector, the development of cooperatives has not been commensurate with the potential, space, and goals and requirements of the Party's policies and the State's laws. The growth rate and contribution rate of this sector to GDP are still low and tend to decrease (currently only about 4%).

Most cooperatives and cooperative groups are small in scale, with little capital, low revenue, and narrow scope of operations. Preliminary statistics by the end of 2024 show that the number of cooperatives with less than 10 employees accounts for more than 70% of the total number of cooperatives in operation; the average revenue is only 3,551 million VND/cooperative/year; the average capital is about less than 10 billion VND/cooperative...

Mr. Bui Anh Tuan - Director of the Department of Private Enterprise Development and Collective Economy spoke at the forum.

With small scale, cooperatives have difficulty expanding production and business, investing in technological innovation, green transformation, improving product quality, and competing with other economic sectors. Production and business efficiency is still low.

In 2024, only 53.9% of cooperatives will have production and business activities. The average profit of a cooperative in 2024 will reach 352 million VND/cooperative/year; the average income of a regular worker in a cooperative will reach 59 million VND/person/year.

“Although the profits and incomes of workers in the collective economic sector and cooperatives have changed positively, they are still slow, and are at risk of falling behind and losing their competitiveness with other economic sectors. Due to low profits and incomes, some people still have the mentality of trading the environment for the economy, following the mindset of growth first and cleaning up later,” Mr. Tuan emphasized.

According to the Ministry of Finance, the internal linkages of cooperatives are still very weak, the content of linkages and services for members are still simple. Joint ventures and linkages between cooperatives and between cooperatives and other economic organizations, research facilities, and technology transfer are not popular.

The ability to access State support policies for the collective economic sector and cooperatives is still limited. The allocation of career funding is not timely, not meeting both the demand for funding quantity and policy content. Currently, there is no separate preferential credit package for the collective economic sector and cooperatives. The qualifications and capacity of the cooperative management staff have been improved but are still low compared to other sectors.

In order for the support policy for the collective economic sector to aim for green growth, creating favorable conditions for cooperatives to access technology, finance, training and expand the market, the Ministry of Finance recommends actively implementing the 2023 Law on Cooperatives and its guiding documents. Proactively review, amend, supplement, adjust or abolish mechanisms and policies in the sectors and fields under its management that are not suitable to the actual situation, or are in conflict with the 2023 Law on Cooperatives and its guiding documents.

At the same time, it is necessary to monitor and remove difficulties in establishing and allocating budgets to implement policies to support the development of collective economy and cooperatives.

Ha Anh

Source: https://doanhnghiepvn.vn/kinh-te/chinh-sach/loi-nhuan-khu-vuc-kinh-te-tap-the-hop-tac-xa-con-thap/20250411100523262