ILO COOP 100 Symposium - Launch of Publications


The first publication that was celebrated during the symposium is “Statistics of Cooperatives: Concepts, classification, work and economic contribution measurements”. The book on statistics of cooperatives is a joint initiative of the International Labour Office (ILO), Committee for the Promotion and Advancement of Cooperatives (COPAC) and the International Centre of Research and Information on Public, Social and Cooperative Economy (CIRIEC). The volume brings together updated versions of four background studies produced for the ILO and COPAC in the process leading up to the adoption of the Guidelines concerning statistics of cooperatives at the 20th International Conference of Labour Statisticians (ICLS) in October 2018. Together with the guidelines, the book is intended to help statisticians to capture more information on key trends and challenges in the world of cooperatives.

At the launch, Enterprises Department Director Vic Van Vuuren spoke as Chair of COPAC. He noted the role of COPAC technical working group on statistics of cooperatives, that comprised of government agencies in charge of cooperatives and national statistical office, cooperative movement representatives, researchers and experts, in advancing the guidelines on statistics of cooperatives. The Director of ILO STATISTICS Department, Rafael Diez de Medina, noted the process of generating statistical norms through the International Conference of Labour Statisticians. He noted the steps that led to the guidelines on statistics of cooperatives and the way forward. Barbara Sak, Senior economic researcher and Managing Director of CIRIEC noted the importance that CIRIEC gives to the partnership with the ILO and reflected on the value of the joint publication. She also underlined the need for cooperative researchers, related government authorities and national statistical offices to work together.

The second publication that was launched during the session was the special retrospective issue on “Cooperatives and the ILO over 100 Years: A selection of 12 Articles”. ILO COOP Programme Manager, Simel Esim presented the process leading to the selection of the 12 articles. She noted that Marie J. Bouchard, Professor at Université du Québec à Montréal (Canada), and Marieke Louis, Associate Professor at Sciences Po Grenoble (France ), have taken lead as co-editors of this retrospective issue analyzing more than 176 articles that were published in APCE between 1925 and 2019. Of these 176 papers they further narrowed the selection to 40 and then to 21 articles. Bernard Thiry, Director General of CIRIEC International noted that the research published in the Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, published on behalf of the Edgard Milhaud Foundation of CIRIEC, has been a key resource in promoting the work of cooperatives and wider SSE both at the global and local levels.