Co-organized by the International Co-operative Alliance – Asia and Pacific (ICA-AP), the ICA-EU Partnership on Co-operatives in Development and the Sri Lankan cooperative movement, the 1st Asia-Pacific Cooperative Development Conference took place in Colombo, Sri Lanka from 26 to 28 February 2018.

Abdul Razzak Farzan and Nihal Devagiri from ILO Country Office for Sri Lanka and the Maldives and Mounir Kleibo from ILO Representative Office in Jerusalem participated in the conference and contributed as panellists at two different panel sessions on “Eradicating poverty: Opportunity, protection and empowerment” and “Improving access to basic goods and services: Economic, social and cultural aspects”.

They shared the experiences of ILO working with cooperatives in the Palestinian and post conflict Northern Sri Lankan contexts. They also highlighted the role of the ILO in cooperative development across a range of areas including supporting policy reform to improve cooperatives’ access to markets and services, and capacity building programs to deliver better services to their members.

The conference brought together policy makers, international organizations and cooperative movement representatives from 25 countries across the Asia-Pacific region, to discuss and build development partnerships among cooperatives and other stakeholders in the pursuit of sustainable development. For the full agenda please see here.