ILO's work on cooperatives in Africa
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Publication
Cooperating out of poverty: The renaissance of the African cooperative movement
02 February 2009
This book offers an objective analysis of the state of affairs of the cooperative sector in Africa since the liberalization of the economy in the early 1990s.
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Publication
Working Paper No. 9 - Cooperatives: a path to economic and social empowerment in Ethiopia
01 February 2009
Traditional cooperatives associations existed in Ethiopian society centuries ago in the form of iqub and idir. Iqub is an association of people having common objectives of mobilizing resources, especially finance, and distributing it to members on rotating basis. Idir is an association of people that have the objective of providing social and economic insurance for the members in the events of death, accident, damages to property, among others. In the case of funeral, Idir serves as funeral insurance where community members elect their leaders, contribute resources either in kind or in cash and support the mourning member.
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Publication
Cooperating out of poverty - the renaissance of African cooperatives movement
10 August 2008
Eradicating poverty in Sub-Saharan Africa continues to be the biggest challenge for the global community today. During the last 25 years, the number of poor has doubled from 150 million to 300 million, half the population surviving on $1 a day or less. According to the report of the Commission for Africa, “the continent needs successful African entrepreneurs and a strong and vibrant small enterprise sector to provide the innovation and productivity growth necessary for long-term poverty reduction”.
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Project
Cooperative Facility for Africa - CoopAfrica
09 July 2008
The Cooperative Facility for Africa - CoopAfrica is a technical cooperation programme of the ILO, under DFID funding. From its office in Dar-es-Salaam (Tanzania), CoopAfrica covers 9 countries in Eastern and Southern Africa. CoopAfrica assists cooperatives to improve their governance, efficiency and performance in order to strengthen their capacity to create jobs, access markets, generate income, reduce poverty, provide social protection and give people a voice in society.