New Delhi: Cooperation Minister Amit Shah on Tuesday announced that over 300 cooperatives, including Amul and IFFCO, have been on-boarded on the GeM portal as buyers and asked them to also register as suppliers to expand their business. On Tuesday, Shah virtually launched the onboarding process on the GeM portal. In June, the Union Cabinet expanded the mandate for the Government e-Marketplace (GeM) to allow cooperatives societies to procure goods and services through the public procurement portal. Earlier they were not allowed to register as 'buyers' on the GeM platform.
In the first phase, cooperatives that have a turnover/deposits of Rs 100 crore are being on-boarded. As many as 589 eligible co-operatives have been identified and out of that more than 300 have already been onboarded, enabling them to place their purchase orders from Tuesday itself. There are more than 8.5 lakh cooperatives in India and around 29 crore people are associated with these societies. Major cooperatives that have been onboarded so far include IFFCO, KRIBHCO, NAFED, Amul and Saraswat Co-op Bank. Orders worth Rs 25 crore are expected to be placed on the day of the launch.
While addressing the event, Shah said: "The doors have now opened for co-operatives to buy from the GeM portal". He said more than 300 cooperatives societies, including 45 multi-state cooperative societies, have already been on-boarded. The minister said the eligibility criteria for registering as a buyer will be relaxed going forward. However, Shah, who also holds the portfolio of the home ministry, pointed out that the number of co-operatives societies registered as a seller on the GeM portal is the lowest.
The minister urged them to start registering as sellers as the platform provides huge business opportunities. "We need to expand the market for co-operatives. All government organisations buy from the GeM portal. I appeal to all co-operatives that they should register on GeM as sellers. GeM is the best medium to increase sales," he said. At the event, Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal said the initiative will make trade easy for cooperatives and result in a lot of savings. With cooperatives joining the portal, he said, the value of trade on the GeM platform will rise significantly. "Business worth Rs 2.80 lakh crore has taken place in the last six years," Goyal said, adding that the target of Rs 2 lakh crore for this fiscal would now have to be revised with the on-boarding of cooperatives.
National Cooperative Union of India (NCUI) President Dileep Sanghani termed it a historic day for cooperatives, saying this would help them in a big way. Cooperative societies needed a platform to avail competitive prices through a transparent and efficient process. Therefore, the Cabinet decided to allow them to register as a buyer on GeM.
Recently, the Cooperation Ministry made NCUI the nodal agency to facilitate the onboarding of cooperatives and coordinating with the GeM authorities. In the first phase, cooperative societies/banks with turnover/deposits of more than Rs 100 crore as per the latest financial statement and with an A grade audit rating (wherever applicable) are being taken up for onboarding. NCUI has compiled a list of cooperatives with turnover/deposits of Rs 100 crore and forwarded this information to GeM. The GeM has been set up as the national procurement portal to provide an end-to-end online marketplace for central and state government departments/ ministries, PSUs etc for common-use goods and services in a transparent and efficient manner.
It is open to all government buyers, such as central ministries, state departments, public sector enterprises, autonomous bodies, panchayats and now cooperatives. According to the cooperation ministry statement, to date, about 61,851 government buyers and around 48.75 lakh sellers and service providers are registered on the GeM and they have listed more than 45 lakh products in over 10,000 products and 288 service categories. "1.08 crore+ orders worth Rs 2,78,504 crore have been fulfilled on the GeM platform," it added. The procurement through the GeM platform will lead to saving of time and reduction of administrative costs for cooperatives. (PTI)
