Calamba coop officers undergo free training-seminars

by Anel Azel F. Dimaano

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Officers from 64 Calamba cooperatives will be trained in a series of training-seminars focusing on credit, risk, and financial management. These training-seminars will run for six sessions and had its first session on credit management last August 12, at the Calamba City Training Center, Poblacion, Calamba City.

Succeeding session on credit management will be on September 30. Risk management sessions will be conducted on August 31 and October 21. Lastly, financial management sessions shall take place on September 7 to 8, and October 13 to 14.

In credit management sessions, Calamba cooperative officers will learn about ways to handle loans as both debtors and debtees. In risk management sessions, participants will be taught how to deal with consequences of irresponsible money lending and loaning, while in financial management sessions, participants will learn about financial standards, responsible money lending, money budgeting, and finance analyses construction

The free-training seminars were facilitated by the Institute of Cooperatives and Bio-Enterprise Development (ICOPED) of the University of the Philippines Los Baños (UPLB), in cooperation with the Cooperative and Livelihood Development Department (CLDD) of Calamba, Laguna.

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These training-seminars for cooperative officers are mandatory trainings by the Cooperative Development Authority (CDA) and are all funded by the local government unit (LGU) of Calamba. According to ICOPED University Researchers II Alicia Quicoy, the training-seminars aim to enhance their knowledge about the basics of cooperatives. Arminga Peria.

Gusto (rin) namin (maturuan sila) to do their duties and responsibilities effectively (We also want them to learn more about how to fulfil their duties and responsibilities effectively),” Quicoy said.

In the training sessions, Calamba cooperative officers learn lessons through various financial experts speakers. These financial experts are mostly Certified Public Accountants (CPAs) and members of the UPLB College of Economics and Management (CEM) faculty.

Aside from giving the lectures, financial experts also help address the concerns of cooperative officers in the training-seminars. The usual concerns raised are mainly about cooperative officers who do not contribute money for lending and how to ask them to pay.

The training-seminars for cooperative officers have been an annual event of the Calamba CLDD and ICOPED since 2012. ICOPED was tasked by the Calamba CLDD to organize and conduct the training-seminars because the Institute is an accredited training provider (ATP) of the CDA. Training-seminars given by non-accredited organizations by the CDA will not be honored otherwise.

All training-seminars are in compliance to the revised implenting rules and regulations (IRR) of Republic Act 9520 or the “Philippine Cooperative Code of 2008”. Notable among the revised IRR are the amended number of required trainings for officers which was formerly 20 but now reduced to 5, and the addition of credit and risk management trainings.

Quicoy said that the training-seminars reiterate the role cooperatives play in the economic development of the Philippines. Cooperatives help boost employment, she added.

She added that, “cooperatives are strategies for poverty alleviation and sustainable development” because they contribute to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of the Philippines which she says makes up 4.87% of the 2012 GDP.

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