How the 300 largest cooperatives are moving forward to achieve the SDGs

World Cooperative Monitor, Report 2018 highlights

by Bruno Roelants and Gianluca Salvatori

The International Cooperative Alliance (the Alliance) and the European Research Institute on Cooperative and Social Enterprises (Euricse) present the seventh annual World Cooperative Monitor report. This publication reports on the world’s largest cooperative and mutual organisations, providing rankings of the Top 300 and sectorial analysis based on 2016 financial data.

This year’s results show the largest organisations in the cooperative movement performing well, with only slight variations to the top positions across the sectors. In the Top 300 ranking based on turnover the French Groupe Crédit Agricole and Groupe BPCE place first and second respectively, with BVR of Germany ranking third. And in the Top 300 based on the ratio of turnover over gross domestic product (GDP) per capita ranking, reintroduced this year, IFFCO from India holds the top position. The ratio of turnover over GDP is not intended to compute the contribution of each enterprise to the national GDP, but rather to relate the turnover of the enterprise to the wealth of the country in which it operates, as GDP per capita measures the purchasing power of an economy in an internationally comparable way.

We would like to give special thanks this year to our ever-committed sponsors, OCB System and Fundación Espriu. OCB System made a particular effort this year to promote the report and encourage questionnaire submissions in Brazil, resulting in 63 questionnaires from Brazilian cooperatives. We hope to see the total number of questionnaires rise from all around the globe, which would greatly enhance the analysis we can provide about the cooperative movement. We encourage all federations to continue to remind their members to participate actively in the World Cooperative Monitor call for data.

We are also excited to present a new feature of the report: a special analysis of the Top 300 and the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). This new addition to the WCM report takes a look at how the largest cooperative enterprises and mutuals in the world are moving towards achieving the SDGs, examining documents reported to the UN Global Compact project and Global Reporting Initiative (GRI). We are proud to find many examples of cooperative and mutual enterprises developing projects and initiatives to ensure fair labour, protect the environment, and much more to meet the SDGs. Featured within the section are also stories about the actions taken by Grupo Sancor Seguros (Argentina), Metsä Group (Finland) and Sicredi (Brazil), three of the Top 300. We also hear from one of the world’s leaders in SDG development, adoption, and promotion, Enrico Giovannini.

Many thanks to all of the contributing enterprises and collaborators who produced this year’s edition of the report!