The Union Cabinet has approved the registration of cooperative societies as ‘Buyers’ on the Government e-Marketplace (GeM) platform. GeM is hosted by the Director General of Supplies and Goods (DGS&D) where common user goods and services can be procured. It is a dynamic, self-sustaining and user-friendly portal for making procurement by government officers.
This will enable the cooperative societies to access more than 45 Lakh vendors on a single platform. It will follow a transparent, economic and efficient procurement system.
The Union Cabinet has approved a proposal to enable the Government e-Marketplace (GeM) portal for on-boarding cooperative societies as buyers of Goods and Services required by them.
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— Ministry of Cooperation, Government of India (@MinOfCooperatn) June 1, 2022
The Ministry of Cooperation is urging Multi-State Co-operative Societies and Co-operative Societies registered under State Co-operative Acts to join the GeM platform so that their members can benefit from it.
Currently, there are about 8.54 lakh cooperatives in India with about 29 crore membership. They have been performing a wide range of activities for the production of goods and services. To support their operations, these cooperatives make huge purchases of goods and services from the open market. There was a felt need to provide a platform to them to avail competitive prices through a transparent and efficient process resulting in benefit to the members of the cooperative societies, stated a ministry of cooperation press release.
GeM has been set up as a National Procurement Portal to provide an end-to-end online marketplace for central & state government ministries or departments, and PSUs etc. for procurement of common-use goods and services in a transparent and efficient manner.
The Gross Merchandise Value of procurement using GeM was more than Rs.1 lakh crore in the FY 2021-22. There are around 54 lakh products listed across 9,702 product categories and 279 service categories. There was an estimated savings of around Rs.10,000 crores in the FY 2021-22, the press release said further.
Purchases through GeM will provide benefits like: The Cooperatives would get competitive prices through an open and transparent process, and this would be economically beneficial to the members of the societies. The Cooperative societies can procure from about 45 lakh authenticated sellers or service providers available across the country on a single GeM platform,
following the standard procedures on GeM would lead to saving of time and reduction in the administrative burden. It would enhance the credibility of the cooperatives as complaints of mismanagement of funds will get reduced. GeM authorities will provide a dedicated on-boarding process for cooperatives, technical infrastructure and support for on-boarding and transactions, via available contact centres, in-field training, and other support services.