South African National Apex Cooperative (Sanaco) president Lawrence Bale says cooperatives in South Africa have benefited “hugely” from the third Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa (Brics) Cooperative Meeting, which ended in Cape Town on Sunday.

Cooperatives leaders gathered to deliberate on ways to facilitate bilateral and multilateral cooperation among cooperative enterprises in the Brics countries, as well as to discuss possible implementation mechanisms for the memorandum of understanding (MoU) that was signed during the second Brics Cooperatives Leaders Meeting in Beijing, China, in 2011.

Bale’s comments came as the South African cooperatives umbrella body, which co-hosted the two-day meeting in collaboration with the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), signed MoUs with its Chinese and Indian counterparts to foster business partnerships between cooperatives in their various economies.

Bale held that, through the MoUs, the national umbrella bodies of cooperatives had committed to realising true and viable collaboration between all cooperative enterprises.

“We have also agreed to facilitate trade and investment cooperation between cooperatives through exhibitions, trade fairs and the exchange of strategic visits of delegates,” he noted.

Bale added that a critical outcome of the meeting for Sanaco was the realisation that far more needed to be done to facilitate enhanced cooperative development in South Africa.

“Cooperatives in other countries are far advanced compared with ours and are contributing immensely in terms of creating employment for citizens in their countries,” he noted.

DTI deputy director-general of broadening participation Sipho Zikode added in a statement on Monday that he was optimistic that the resolutions of the summit would lead to the opening of markets for cooperatives in the Brics countries and lead to sustainable trade among them.

He described that meeting as an “eye-opener” for local cooperatives, adding that the South African cooperatives benefited more than those from other countries.

“We learnt that cooperatives in these countries are highly developed and are operating at the high end of the value chain in various sectors. They contribute significantly to the gross domestic products of their countries, while ours are still at entry- and small, medium-sized and microenterprise levels.