The Department of economic development in Sharjah signed a memorandum of understanding with the Sharjah cooperative society in aim of supporting the implementation of the Sharjah age-friendly program and it’s one of the initiatives of the new strategic plan for age-friendly cities 2021-2023. The goal of the initiative is involving the elderly in commercial operations to transfer expertise to current generations as well as supporting an developing the local agricultural product. The memorandum of understanding keen on its strategy to contribute to planning and leading the comprehensive economic development in the emirate and developing the services provided to customers and creating a sustainable comprehensive social and economic environment that allows the elderly to easily benefit from their resources to improve their quality of life, share their experiences with others and contribute to achieving social development through the implementation of the initiative. Sharjah supports the elderly by displaying and promoting agricultural products for the elderly in all the headquarters of the Sharjah Cooperative Society in the emirate.

The signed memorandum of cooperation is an important achievement in line with the directives of His Highness Sheikh Dr. Sultan bin Muhammad Al Qasimi, Member of the Supreme Council and Ruler of Sharjah, and the follow-up of His Highness Sheikh Sultan bin Muhammad bin Sultan Al Qasimi, Crown Prince and Deputy Ruler of Sharjah and Chairman of the Executive Council, which places the human being its first goal and focus of attention. It stresses the imperative of helping male and female citizens to enter markets, practice economic work, support their actions, initiatives and ideas to launch their work to the horizons of success and sustainability in accordance with the standards of the global economy and international changes. Also, the role of the Sharjah Cooperative Society for its important role in sponsoring and supporting their products, which constitutes a qualitative strategic partnership that has a remarkable impact on the growth of the national commercial stream and supporting the sustainable economy in the emirate. The Sharjah Cooperative as the first and largest cooperative society in the country, provides all facilities to farm owners to supply their agricultural products to the branches in terms of the procedures for farm registration, the supply mechanism and the priority of displaying products. In addition, coordinating with the Department of Municipal Affairs to work on providing guidance regarding local agriculture and applying approved standards for agriculture of organic and sustainable agriculture.

The cooperative has worked to add services to owners of agricultural crops in order to improve the quality of services as it has provided about 120 workers in its more than 36 branches spread in the emirate whose main task is to receive products from farmers, transport them from their vehicles and display them in the right ways on the shelves of sale, while giving priority to supply for the domestic product. The services provided by the cooperative to farm owners will work to raise the percentage of their income during the coming period and the range of services will be expanded in the future to include the provision of vehicles to transport crops of vegetables and fruits from farms to all branches which will save farmers from the transportation expense and raise the value of profits.