THE Penang Cooperative Commission of Malaysia (SKM) is planning to close down cooperatives that are listed as ‘dormant’.
SKM Penang director Zakaria Mat Jusoh said that currently there were 744 cooperatives with 166,060 members in the state.
“From the 744 cooperatives, 70% of them are still active while the remaining 30% are inactive and dormant.
“A cooperative will be classified as dormant if it does not conducted its annual general meeting (AGM) over the years and does not organise any programmes and activities at all.
“Dormant cooperatives do not contribute to the society and SKM, hence, action is needed to close down such cooperatives,” Zakaria said in his speech during the digital entrepreneurship programme at Cititel Penang today.
The programme was officiated by Deputy Chief Minister I Datuk Ahmad Zakiyuddin Abdul Rahman.
Regarding the inactive cooperatives, Zakaria said SKM would try to help them to be active again.
“An inactive cooperative is defined when they only conducted a few programmes and activities over the years.
“So, we will try to help them in whatever ways we can,” he added.
Meanwhile, Zakiyuddin urged all cooperatives in Penang to embrace the digital platform to promote and sell their products.
“Apart from their physical stores, they must market their products online to maximise their profits and also to thrive in the digital industry,” he added.
On a separate matter, Zakaria also announced that SKM would set up its first one-stop centre in Penang, known as ‘Cooperatives Transformation Centre’ at Level 3, Komtar.
“The one-stop centre will be able to provide services to people who venture into the cooperatives field.
“It is expected to operate by the end of this year. More details will be announced soon,” he said.
Zakiyuddin also launched the ‘Penang 50 Index Cooperative 2019’ book.
The book listed 50 best cooperatives in Penang for the year 2019.
They were ranked based on financial factors, revenue, assets and shareholders’ fund.
Story by Riadz Akmal
Pix by Adleena Rahayu Ahmad Radzi