In its 76th Annual Board meeting on 29 March in Geneva, the members of the Committee for the Promotion and Advancement of Cooperatives (COPAC) re-committed to continued collaboration on promoting and advocating people-centred, self-sustaining cooperative enterprises, namely through joint work on the celebration of the International Day of Cooperatives and the improvement of cooperative statistics.
For the 2017 International Day, COPAC will produce a video to showcase the contributions of cooperatives to inclusive development and organise a high-level event at the United Nations in New York. The theme of the day is inclusion and will celebrate ‘Cooperatives ensure no one is left behind’.
COPAC will coordinate a technical working group of experts in collaboration with the International Labour Organization to improve the quality and accessibility of cooperative statistics. This joint effort will result in recommendations and knowledge prepared for the next International Conference of Labour Statisticians in 2018.
During the Board meeting, COPAC welcomed the International Labour Organization as incoming Chair for the next two years, and expressed thanks to the International Co-operative Alliance for its successful tenure.