On Monday 25 November, the International Co-operative Alliance (ICA) inaugurated its International Conference in New Delhi, an event which taking place in India for the first time in 130 years, and which will bring together the main leaders in the co-operative movement and the global social economy until Saturday 30 November. The event also kicked off the International Year of Co-operatives 2025, approved by the United Nations.
The event, organised by the Indian Farmers Fertiliser Cooperative Limited (IFFCO) and the 18 member organisations of the ICA in the host country, was opened by numerous personalities from the global co-operative movement, with speeches from the UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres; the President of the ICA, Ariel Guarco; the Prime Minister of India, Shri Narendra Modi, and the Director General of the International Labour Organisation (ILO), Gilbert F. Houngbo, among others.
During his speech, Antonio Guterres expressed his gratitude and admiration to the cooperative world, highlighting its role in ‘finding global solutions’ to multiple challenges. He warned that our world is facing complex challenges, and it is striving to make progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals. ‘Rest assured that we will continue to call on governments to recognise their critical work through national budgets and development plans,’ the UN Secretary-General said.
The theme of the conference is ‘Cooperatives building prosperity for all people’. It will include four plenary sessions, each accompanied by four parallel sessions around four key themes: Enabling Policy and Entrepreneurial Ecosystem, Reaffirming Cooperative Identity, Nurturing Purposeful Leadership, and Shaping a Just, Equal and Resilient Future.
The international event was the showcase for the launch of the International Year of Co-operatives 2025 (IYCY2025), with the slogan ‘Co-operatives are building a better world’, as a demonstration of the permanent impact of co-operatives worldwide, a slogan which seeks to highlight the importance of this economic model in accelerating the work to achieve the SDGs by 2030.
Rochdale Pioneers Award
The stage of the ICA International Conference was also the venue for the presentation of the prestigious Rochdale Pioneers Award to Dr. Udai Shanker Awasth, for his contribution to the growth and development of co-operatives in India and the promotion of the spirit of the Indian co-operative model worldwide.
U.S. Awasth is regarded in the cooperative sector as a pioneer in the Indian fertiliser industry.
New vanguard hub
This Conference was also an opportunity to present ASETT, the name chosen for the new Vanguard Hub of Social Economy promoted by CEPES, Social Economy Europe and the Ministry of Labour and Social Economy of the Spanish Government.
Behind the acronym ASETT is the ‘Arizmendiarrieta Social Economy Think Tank’, a project that will be located in the Miramar Palace in Donostia-San Sebastian, and will be developed around three areas: Social Transformation, whose aim is to study the role of business in reducing inequalities and in socio-professional integration; an International Centre for Economic-Social Prospective, which will analyse challenges and opportunities, drawing up future scenarios to help Governments and Public Administrations; and, finally, a Social Laboratory, which will develop collective entrepreneurship activities focused on people, in order to move towards a new, fairer and more equitable economy.
