National Agricultural Cooperative Federation (NACF)’s Economic Unit has declared another leap forward on the occasion of the first year of full-fledged restructuring of agricultural business portfolios.
NACF Chairman Choi Won-byung, NACF Economic Unit CEO Lee Sang-wook and some 200 executives and staff members assembled at the NACF Central Educational Institute on Feb. 6 and pledged to invigorate agricultural cooperatives’ businesses. The participants vowed to translate into action their top four goals, including ancient Korean scholar Jung Yang-yong’s top three tenets of making farming meet its ends, making farmers comfortable and enhancing farmers’ standing in society.
Participients, consisting of executives, team leaders and higher officials set the 2015 revenue target at 19.548 trillion won.
They adopted three main strategies and 10 core tasks to cope with such uncertainties as the sagging national economy, the transfer of businesses to NACF Economic Holdings and a drop in profits stemming from a rise in new investments.
NACF decided to move into emergency management footing to brace for the exacerbation of management conditions. To this end, the federation plans to expand the Every Day Low Cost (EDLC) campaign designed to cut down on unit costs. KACF also plans to brace for worsening business conditions through retrenchment and strengthen the unit’s crisis management system.
NACF plans to establish a system to boost collaboration among its units, on the occasion of the first year of restructuring its economic unit’s business portfolios. Executives and staff members will be given incentives to enhance their motivation in line with the operation of evaluation and reward regimes tailored to meet the new business structure. The federation’s economic unit plans to secure new growth momentum for sustainable growth by invigorating the home shopping business.
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NACF officials gesture for solidarity while attending a meeting designed to discuss how to explore agricultural produce and foods.(Photos:NACF)
Local Food Outlets on a Row
NACF Economic Unit CEO Lee met with executives and staff members of the Yeosu Agricultural Cooperative on March 12 and discussed ways of invigorating its local food business and boosting farmers participation.
It was in 2012 that the Yongjin Agricultural Cooperative in Jeollabuk-do established the nation’s first NH local food outlet. The figure has increased to 51 since then, which accounts for 70 percent of the nation’s local food direct outlets, whose number stands at 71.
NH local food outlets saw revenues triple to 66.2 billion won.
NACF officials said the number of NH local food outlets will rise to 75 with the goal of posting 100 billion won in sales during 2015. To this end, NACF plans to operate local food experts’ teams to provide guidance on the operation of local food outlets and strengthen such educational programs as local food academies.
In particular, NACF plans to beef up education in the use of agricultural chemicals to ensure the safety of items at local food outlets, conduct each outlet’s own safety checks and strengthen NACF’s random safety examinations.
“Local food is a creative direct transaction model that brings benefits not only to producers, but also to consumers, differentiating itself from the conventional unified distribution method,” said NACE Economic Unit CEO Lee.
Lee said he will do his utmost to ensure the successful settlement of direct local food outlets to boost farmers’ income and invigorate the regional economy.
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