SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
The theme for Coops Day 2023 was “Cooperatives: Partners in Sustainable Development,” and it’s incredibly appropriate. The principle of working to sustainably develop one’s community is deeply embedded in the cooperative movement, making it the perfect launchpad for sustainable development.
Sustainable development is defined by the ICA as “Development that will through the economic, environmental and social benefits it creates, improve the living standards of current and future generations, contribute to peaceful co-existence, social cohesion, social justice and social progress, and do so in a way that protects and does not degrade the natural environment.” Sustainable development has been determined to be a global priority by the United Nations and can be expressed through their set of 17 Sustainable Development Goals, or SDGs– each of which can easily be connected to the cooperative movement both and in practice.
The basis of the connection between SDGs and cooperatives lies in SDG #8: Decent Work and Economic Growth. Notably, while SDG #8 is focused on increasing employment and productivity, it also emphasizes equitable pay, inclusivity, and the availability of “decent work” based on standards of morality. This goal can be empirically correlated to the cooperative movement while also directly aligning with cooperative values.
Cooperatives serve to create millions of jobs and generate a lot of income. Put simply, cooperatives make a lot of money, which is especially beneficial for economic growth as it is reinvested in the community along with the cooperative itself.
Moreover, the cooperative movement is defined by its commitment to providing decent work. Cooperatives’ democratic structure ensures good conditions and prevents exploitation. Meanwhile, the cooperative movement’s prioritization of worker well-being over profit preserves the human element, ensuring moral standards and encouraging cooperative values like solidarity and equity, which translates into a work environment that is generally more decent than that of traditionally structured companies.
ECONOMIC EMPOWERMENT
The cooperative movement’s commitment to decent work contributes to both the economic and social change associated with economic empowerment of workers, which connects cooperatives with several other entwined sustainable development goals.
First, there’s SDG #1: No Poverty. This goal aligns with the core aim of cooperatives: to advance their workers' social and economic wellbeing. Cooperatives’ main priority are to ensure that these needs are met and that their workers have the opportunity to grow. As explained in an ICA report on Sustainable Development, “cooperatives have the advantages of identifying economic opportunities for the poor, empowering the disadvantaged to defend their interests, and providing security to the poor by allowing them to convert individual risks into collective risk.”
Second, there’s SDG #10: Reduced Inequalities, which aligns with the cooperative values of equity and equality. Cooperatives ensure reduced inequalities from the base up, with the cooperatives structured with equality in mind. For instance, cooperative culture is based on trust and solidarity, not competition, and they function democratically without much formal hierarchy. Thus no one is scrambling to step on heads and reach the “top,” and since no one is above anyone else, inequality within the cooperative is effectively impossible. In addition to this, cooperatives tend to create further measures to ensure that equality among worker-members remains intact. For instance, the Mondragon Corporation in the Basque Country enacted a 1 to 6 salary ratio for owners to workers, systemically limiting income inequality.
Cooperatives also empower women to gain equality, aiding with SDG #5: Gender Equality. As the ICA’s Gender Equality Committee (GEC) recognized in 2022, “Cooperatives, as people-centered economic models – through their values of self-help, equality and equity, and principles of voluntary and open membership and democratic control – are well-placed to address many of the issues that negatively impact women, especially to address the multifaceted issue of poverty and shape women’s wellbeing.” To this end, there are several key ways in which the cooperative movement is invaluable in achieving equality for women. Importantly, cooperatives increase women’s access to economic opportunities and resources. Then, the movement creates an enabling environment to ensure that women are able to use those opportunities to achieve economic empowerment. This way, women can be in a good position to challenge social and cultural norms and empower themselves individually and socially.
Here, it is important to note how the different facets of development are intertwined– for instance, how social empowerment is associated with economic empowerment. This concept connects to SDG #9: Industry, Innovation, and Infrastructure, as there exists a mutually reinforcing relationship between social and industrial development. This is because industrialization is able to promote various social objectives. Economically it can help with employment creation and poverty eradication, and socially it can put the infrastructure in place to promote access to basic needs like education and healthcare. The cooperative movement is also a leader in innovation due to its worker-centric model. As the ICA GEC explained in 2019, “..innovation comes from people – and cooperatives, by placing the onus on members themselves to resolve their needs and aspirations, constantly adapt to the demands of a continually-evolving society.” Cooperatives are able to evolve and innovate because they invest in their workers. They recognize workers’ human value which often translates into education and later innovation.
THE COOPERATIVE SECTORS AND SDGs
The cooperative movement is split into several sectors including agriculture, financial services, fishing, housing, industry, insurance, utilities, and retail, among others. Many of these sectors are directly related to sustainable development goals.
The Agriculture and Fishing sectors together support 2 sustainable development goals: SDG #2: Zero Hunger and SDG #14: Life Below Water. Agriculture cooperatives not only give farmers a voice, they support them materially with lower transport costs, access to financing, and reduction of crop losses. Agriculture cooperatives fight to avoid food loss and waste in their supply chains, ensuring that more food is available for the hungry population and a more sustainable food production model. In the cooperative fishing sector, enterprises value fishing sustainably and execute sustainable fishing practices while also providing sustainable fishing education to expand the reach of sustainable development practices beyond the cooperative movement.
The Health sector supports SDG #3: Good Health and Well-being. Quickly, it should be noted that the entire cooperative movement is relevant to SDG #3, as cooperatives’ main priority is the wellbeing of their worker-members, and any profits work toward the wellbeing of people and the community. More specifically, though, the cooperative movement includes a very relevant health sector. As is true in the rest of the cooperative movement the Health sector prioritizes people over profit, improving conditions for both patients and doctors. Unimed, one of the largest medical cooperatives in Brazil, not only prioritizes their workers and patients, but also has a focus on sustainability, creating a sustainability program in 2015 focused around reducing waste and water and energy consumption.
Sanitation cooperatives also support SDG #3 as well as SDG #6: Clean Water and Sanitation. A good example of this is the Cooperative Water for Sanitation and Health, a sanitation and health cooperative in Indonesia. This cooperative has “provided clean, abundant, and accessible water to 28,580 people in coffee-producing villages, leading to 100% of community members using new water systems… [and] has built 50 water systems and trained 54 Water Management Committees to organise volunteer labour for construction and maintenance of the systems,” according to the ICA website.
The Education sector supports SDG #4: Quality Education. Education is engrained in the cooperative identity, with the fifth cooperative principle being Education, Training, and Information. Cooperatives aim for inclusive and accessible education to create a culture of knowledge sharing. This model supports innovation through the unlocking of member potential, creates an informed citizenry to make democracy possible, and increases development while decreasing inequalities.
CLIMATE CHANGE
Finally, cooperatives are uniquely placed to address SDG #13: Climate Action. Because members are in a democratic system, they can more easily choose to make personal sacrifices required by climate change without the profit margins impeding progress. There is also more mobilization because members are more easily able to personally own the change, making them more invested in cooperatives’ various climate action projects.
These principles have been proven in practice, as cooperatives are leading the way in making large scale reforms to combat the climate crisis. For example, insurance cooperative have begun giving “climate insurance” to help aid the transitioning to a greener economy
CONCLUSION
The cooperative movement stands as a powerful force for sustainable development, embodying the sustainable development goals outlined by the United Nations. With their focus on decent work and economic growth, cooperatives not only create jobs and generate income but also ensure equitable pay, inclusivity, and worker well-being. Through economic empowerment, the cooperative movement is able to alleviate poverty and fight inequality.
Moreover, the cooperative sectors directly align with various SDGs, including Zero Hunger, Life Below Water, Good Health and Well-being, Clean Water and Sanitation, and Quality Education, and play a vital role in addressing climate change and supporting SDG #13: Climate Action.
The cooperative movement exemplifies how economic development, social progress, and environmental protection can all be pursued simultaneously. Through their commitment to sustainability and their emphasis on people over profit, cooperatives demonstrate that a more equitable and just world is not only possible but achievable. By embracing the cooperative model and recognizing their role as partners in sustainable development, we can harness the transformative power of cooperation to build a brighter future for all.