Women in agriculture urged to embrace co-ops

Women in agriculture and agriculture-based businesses have been urged to embrace cooperatives and clusters, if they are to continue to develop and remain sustainable.{{more}}

The advice has come from Nisha Glasgow, Business Development field officer at the Centre for Enterprise Development Inc (CED), while presenting the feature address at the Annual General Meeting of the SVG Network of Rural Women Producers Inc (SVGNRWP), held on March 28.

She said that cooperatives, and more specifically clusters, help influence the general economic culture of countries.

“Clusters allow for efficient use of resources through assisting, not individual firms, but a system, [they] promote the development of competitiveness among businesses through enhancing innovation and upgrading value chains, rural development by promoting employment within the community,” she stated, adding that these are just a few of the benefits of working together in groups and which form the foundation for membership rewards.

“To be competitive and survive in a globalized world, organisations and enterprises must constantly adapt to a very dynamic and demanding business environment, improve competitiveness, productivity and quality performance and conduct business in a responsible and sustainable manner. Organisations must be productive, competitive and viable. To do this it must constantly develop the services it provides to members to attract and maintain members, find ways of producing and delivering its mandate within a changing environment and meet the broader expectations of their stakeholders.”

Glasgow further urged the SVGNRWP to embrace change and adapt to trends and challenges in order to help develop its members and to foster entrepreneurship and business development.

Glasgow is also a board member of VincyKlus Inc, the only agro-processing cluster that exists in St Vincent and the Grenadines.

The SVGNRWP Annual General Meeting was held at the UWI Open Campus.