TEHRAN –Women’s cooperative companies are the principal focus of rural development, said Hossein Shirzad, deputy agriculture minister and managing director of the central organization of rural cooperatives of Iran.

Currently, a number of 330 cooperative companies of rural women, including 61,325 members, are working with a capital amount of 26.4 billion rials (nearly $630,000) in 2,238 villages, the public relations office of the Ministry of Agriculture said a press release published on Tuesday.

Rural women’s cooperative companies are one of the most desirable structures for attracting rural women, Shirzad noted adding these cooperative companies are created in order to make policies, coordinate and direct rural women’s activities.

The Rural Cooperatives Organization of Iran, with the aim of developing the cooperative movement through informing rural women, performs its legal duties, the official said, elaborating that the organization have put their quantitative and qualitative development in place pivoting on three axes of supervision, support and guidance of women's cooperatives.

NM/MQ/MG