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CoopAFRICA encourages and supports provision of innovative services to cooperative business models. Such services include among others technical services relevant to cooperatives services; education and training; marketing services; extension services; audit services; financial services etc... This will be key to the cooperative movement in ensuring that it is able to adjust to shifting trends in national and international business models and thereby able to create sustainable income generation and employment strategies.
The Challenge Fund can be used in particular to link demand of services (market needs identified by a cooperative organisation) and supply of services (a business service provider recognised as centre of competence in market access), encouraging the partnership between these two types of organisations. It could also channel funds for strengthening a pool of centres of competence (union, federation, college and/or trade union, employer’s organisation) that need capacity building in upgrading their services to respond to cooperatives business needs.
The following gives some examples of the type of services that can be facilitated and co-financed through this Challenge Fund:
- Technical assistance by an established credit union for the setting up of savings and credit cooperatives in a country or region where such coops do not yet exist;
- Secondment of an expert to advise a cooperative on meeting standards required for exportation;
- Advisory mission to assist in the design of a cooperative policy or the popularization of the existing legislation;
- Adaptation of cooperative management training material successfully used in one country to the conditions in another;
- Savings and credit cooperatives willing to launch new financial products, including (micro)-insurance to tackle decent work deficits;
- Advisory service in setting up a cooperatively managed auditing system;
- Marketing services for unions to enhance the value of products collected from their members.
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