User login

To share, meet and learn for sustainable cocoa

Academic publications

The State of Sustainability Initiatives Review 2014, Potts, Jason, and Lynch Matthew , 06/2014, p.135-155, (2014) , (Academic Publication)
The Role of Cooperative Organizations in Rural Community Development in Nigeria: Prospects and Challenges, Hussain, Muhammad Shehu , Academic Research International , 05/2014, Volume 5, Issue 3, Usmanu Danfodiyo University, Sokoto, NIGERIA., (2014) , (Academic Publication)
Challenges of farmers’ innovativeness in central zone, Tigray, Ethiopia A, Gebre, Girma Gezimu, and Zegeye Dawit Mamo , International Journal of Agricultural Policy and Research, 05/2014, Volume 2, Issue 5, Ethiopia, p.223, (2014) , (Academic Publication)
Effect of crude oil price on Cocoa production in Nigeria (1961-2008): A cointergration and error correction modelling approach, Binuomote, S. O., and Odeniyi K. A. , Wilolud Journal, 09/2013, Volume 3, Issue 23, Nigeria, p.30, (2013) , (Academic Publication)
A product chain organisation study of certified Cocoa supply, Afrane, George, Arvidsson Rickard, Baumann Henrikke, Borg Josefin, Keller Emma, Canals Llorenç Milà í, and Selmer Julie K. , The 6th International Conference on Life Cycle Management, 08/2013, Gothenburg, (2013) , (Academic Publication)

Resilience in a downturn: The power of financial cooperatives

info@cocoaconnect.org's picture
TitleResilience in a downturn: The power of financial cooperatives
Publication TypeReport
AuthorsBirchall, Johnston
Full Text

The report notes that financial cooperatives have fared better than the investor-owned banks in times of crisis. Savings and credit cooperatives, cooperative banks and credit unions have grown, kept credit flowing especially to small and medium sized enterprises, and remained stable across regions of the world while (indirectly) creating employment. It is their unique combination of member ownership, control and benefit that is at the heart of their resilience and that provides a series of advantages over its competitors. With financial cooperatives presenting an astonishingly large slice of the global banking market, it is important to better understand the model.

The report examines financial cooperatives from their origins in the 1850s to the global movement they represent today. It reviews the performance of financial cooperatives, looking in particular at the aftermath of the 2007-2008 crisis and the continuing long austerity period. It explains why they have proven to be more resilient pointing to the specifications of the cooperative model of enterprise, and concludes with a review of practical policy options and recommendations for the way governments and development agencies should approach financial cooperatives not as conduits but as partners in the wider aims of business development, insurance against episodic poverty, and decent work. The report was prepared as a contribution to the United Nations International Year of Cooperatives 2012.

Farmers & production

Sponsors

Logo Ministry of Economic Affairs of the Netherlands

Logo Royal Tropical Institute