• India will host for the first time the general assembly of the International Cooperative Alliance along with a global conference in November this year.
• The theme of the event will be ‘Cooperatives Build Prosperity of All’.
• Around 1,500 distinguished guests from over 100 countries will participate in the event.
• Indian Farmers Fertiliser Cooperative Limited (IFFCO) has taken the initiative to host the ICA General Assembly and Global Cooperative Conference.
• Global Cooperative Conference in India will also mark the official launch of the ‘UN International Year of Cooperatives-2025’.
International Cooperative Alliance
• The International Cooperative Alliance unites, represents and serves cooperatives worldwide.
• Founded in 1895, it is one of the oldest non-governmental organisations and one of the largest ones measured by the number of people represented with one billion cooperative members on the planet.
• It is the apex body representing cooperatives, which are estimated to be around 3 million worldwide, providing a global voice and forum for knowledge, expertise and co-ordinated action for and about cooperatives.
• More than 306 organisations from 105 countries are members of the International Cooperative Alliance.
• The ICA’s members are international and national cooperative organisations from all sectors of the economy, namely agriculture, banking, consumer, fisheries, health, housing, insurance, and industry & services.
• To implement its activities, the ICA is organised with a Global Office based in Brussels, four Regional Offices (Africa, Americas, Asia-Pacific, and Europe), eight Global Sectoral Organisations (agriculture, banking, retail, fisheries, health, housing, insurance, and industry & services), and five Committees and Networks (gender, research, law, youth, and development).
• India was one of the co-founders of this 130-year-old association.
The cooperatives movement
• Cooperatives are people-centred enterprises owned, controlled and run by and for their members to realise their common economic, social, and cultural needs and aspirations.
• The cooperative movement has been also recognised as a distinct and major stakeholder in both national and international affairs.
• Cooperatives’ open membership model affords access to wealth creation and poverty elimination. This results from the co-operative principle of members’ economic participation: ‘Members contribute equitably to, and democratically control, the capital of their co-operative’.
• Because cooperatives are people-centered, not capital-centered, they do not perpetuate, nor accelerate capital concentration and they distribute wealth in a more fair way.
• Cooperatives also foster external equality. As they are community-based, they are committed to the sustainable development of their communities — environmentally, socially and economically. This commitment can be seen in their support for community activities, local sourcing of supplies to benefit the local economy, and in decision-making that considers the impact on their communities.
• Despite their local community focus, cooperatives also aspire to bring the benefits of their economic and social model to all people in the world.
• The cooperative movement is highly democratic, locally autonomous, but internationally integrated, and a form of organisation of associations and enterprises whereby citizens themselves rely on self-help and their own responsibility to meet goals that include not only economic, but also social and environmental objectives, such as overcoming poverty, securing productive employment and encouraging social integration.
• At least 12 per cent of people on earth is a cooperator of any of the three million cooperatives on earth.
• Cooperatives provide jobs or work opportunities to 10 per cent of the employed population, and the largest 300 cooperatives or mutuals generate $2,409.41 billion in turnover while providing the services and infrastructure society needs to thrive (World Cooperative Monitor).
• Cooperatives contribute to the sustainable economic growth and stable, quality employment, providing jobs or work opportunities to 280 million people across the globe, in other words, 10 per cent of the world’s employed population.
• Over 8.5 lakh out of 30 lakh cooperative societies in the world are in India and about 13 crore people are directly associated with them and 91 per cent villages in India have some form of cooperatives working in them.
• AMUL, IFFCO, KRIBHCO, NAFED, etc are some of the well-known success stories of the cooperative movement in India.
