Agriculture Minister Hussein Abdelbagi poses for a photo with FAO partners during the launch of registry for cooperatives in Juba. April 8, 2025. (Photo: Sebit Patrick).

JUBA, (Eye Radio) – The Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security, in partnership with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), has launched the first-ever electronic registry to track data on agricultural cooperatives nationwide.

The electronic registry exercise will be implemented across all 10 states and three administrative areas.

A four-day capacity-building workshop on the management and implementation of the e-registry will begin on Wednesday, 9th April 2025.

The ministry’s Department of Cooperatives has been engaged in the manual registration of cooperative unions and associations. With the new electronic registry, this process will be modernized and streamlined.

Stephen Almadi, a representative from the Cooperative Bank of South Sudan, praised the initiative due to its importance.

He explained that the bank had faced numerous challenges due to the absence of a central registry, as partners often conducted individual data collection.

“This is a very great achievement. We have sought to have a central registry for all cooperative movements in South Sudan. Cooperatives are our DNA, and so we have a very keen interest to get to know where they are, to get to know who they are, and to get to work with them,” Almadi said.

He said the Cooperative Bank has faced many challenges in supporting farmers due to the lack of a central registry.

“This is because each partner who wants to engage the cooperative have done their own data collection. So each partner comes with their own data, which has a very big effect in terms of lack of coordination.”

“So, when you don’t have a central data to work with, what you simply are doing is getting a patch of data, and the information that is given to you is not comprehensive. So we cannot walk the journey together in development of our cooperative. So, this e-registry, we believe, will be able to close that gap.”

The initiative, supported by the FAO, aims to strengthen the cooperative sector.

Speaking at the launch, Louis Bagari, the Cooperative Development Officer for FAO, noted that many cooperative societies in South Sudan conduct business in short cycles. He attributed this to the lack of reliable data, which hinders long-term business sustainability.

“One of the areas which we would like to bring to the attention of the minister and the leadership at the ministry as well as the FAO and all the other stakeholders, has been that most of them do business for short period of time.”

“Because they grow crops, and after production, maybe they sell but they might be doing business only for three months in a year. So it has been a major challenge we are trying to look at how they can be supported for business continuity throughout the year.”

“Doing business for a short period of time their capacity to buy shares to contribute for the business for the continuity of activities of the cooperatives is limited.”

On his part, the Minister of Agriculture and Food Security Hussein Abdelbagi Akol, highlighted the crucial role of cooperatives in South Sudan’s development. These cooperatives include consumer, fisheries, poultry, and entrepreneurship societies.

“We want to bring to the attention of this gathering that the cooperatives are cross-cutting in that they engage in all economic fields,”Abdelbagi said.

“In recognition of this role and importance that cooperative play in development, we have been charged with the duty of organizing, developing, supervising, assisting and protecting cooperative society.”

“Today, we are playing our role of developing and assisting cooperative. The electronic registration is an innovation and development in the registration of cooperative to be fostered, preserve information on cooperatives and to strive the information on cooperatives.”

“We want to foster and know the status of the cooperatives at a glance and foster communication between the ministry and 10 states and three administrative areas. Our aim is to have better cooperative enterprises, better cooperative farming and better lives.”