Opportunity to rise is not small
At the Workshop on perfecting the organization and operation model of cooperative credit institutions (CIs), Dr. Can Van Luc, BIDV Training and Research Institute, frankly pointed out the biggest paradox of this system: a large network but a small scale, not fully exploiting the inherent potential.
According to him, cooperatives are still an important link in the national financial system, especially in rural and agricultural areas. "The QTDND system is an effective channel for mobilizing and leading capital, directly exploiting idle resources among the population, while providing capital for production, business and consumption," Dr. Luc emphasized.
Not only that, he said that this system also contributes to reducing black credit in rural and mountainous areas, where people have many difficulties in accessing bank capital.
According to Dr. Can Van Luc, credit institutions are facing great opportunities when the legal framework is completed, especially the Law on Credit Institutions 2024 and the system of related circulars and decrees.
The market serving rural areas still has a lot of room. Nearly 60% of Vietnam's population lives in rural areas but only 20-25% have bank accounts. This is a market that commercial banks have difficulty accessing due to high operating costs, while credit institutions are cooperatives with the advantage of localization.
In addition, the trend of digital transformation and greening the economy is opening up new business methods, helping to increase access to capital, reduce operating costs, and expand the scope of membership services.
But the road ahead is not flat
Although he clearly recognized the opportunity, Dr. Can Van Luc did not hide his concern because this system still has many inherent limitations.
The scale of a cooperative is very small, with total assets accounting for only 1.15% and charter capital accounting for 0.73% of the entire banking industry. Outstanding credit in the period of 2022-2024 growth is low, not commensurate with the potential.
Only about 10% of cooperatives have access to capital from the Cooperative Development Support Fund, while the capital access rate from credit institutions is less than 1%. In particular, many agricultural cooperatives are almost "out of" the capital game.
The information technology system of the People's Committees has not met the requirements, and products and services are still poor. Loose connectivity and limited management capacity also increase operational risks.
Dr. Luc also noted that customer confidence decreased when some QTDNDs were not functioning well, posing a potential risk to system safety.
Solutions to avoid falling behind
To promote the potential of a cooperative, Dr. Can Van Luc emphasized the need to continue to improve the legal framework, improve management and financial capacity, and promote digital transformation.
In addition, he proposed to diversify products and services, strengthen linkages between QTDND and Co-opBank to optimize resources, reduce costs and increase capital regulation efficiency.
Strengthening customer trust is an urgent task, because only when people trust, can the credit institution system as a cooperative develop sustainably and truly become the main capital channel for rural areas.
Dr. Can Van Luc said that the development path of credit institutions and cooperatives is not easy. However, if the opportunity is well exploited, bottlenecks are overcome and customer trust is maintained, this system can still make a strong breakthrough in the coming time.
