National Cooperative Business Association

The US Overseas Cooperative Development Council Board of Directors has named Paul Hazen its executive director, effective February 1. Hazen brings more than 30 years’ experience in international and domestic cooperative development to the organization. He recently stepped down as president and CEO of the National Cooperative Business Association. Under Hazen’s leadership, NCBA’s international cooperative development portfolio grew from $8 million annually to over $30 million.

Active in numerous cooperative organizations, Hazen serves as board member of the Consumer Federation of America and was a member and chair of the OCDC board. Hazen currently serves on the International Co-operative Alliance board of directors and chairs the United Nations International Year of the Cooperative steering committee.

OCDC brings together organizations committed to building a more prosperous world through cooperatives. Its mission is to champion, advocate and promote effective international cooperative development. OCDC members are global leaders in cooperative development in Africa, Latin America and Asia. With projects in over 70 counties the OCDC members implement the largest portfolio of cooperative development programs in the world.

OCDC's members are ACDI/VOCA, CHF International, Cooperative Resources International, Communications Cooperative International, HealthPartners, Land O'Lakes International Development, National Cooperative Business Association, NRECA and the World Council of Credit Unions.

Philanthropist and Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates has launched a Co-operative Group-sponsored initiative to teach British communities about extreme poverty around the world.

At the launch of the Global Poverty Project’s ambassador programme at the London School of Economics, Mr Gates, Co-Chair of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which funds projects around the world that help to eradicate social injustice, applauded the initiative.

Read more at the Co-operative News: http://www.thenews.coop/article/bill-gates-launches-co-op-backed-anti-poverty-scheme.

From the Star Tribune

Article by: ERIC WIEFFERING

When Brent Heuth and a team of researchers at the University of Wisconsin decided to measure the economic impact of cooperative-owned businesses in the United States, they didn't figure it would be too hard.

After all, co-ops have been around for centuries, and tens of millions of Americans are either members of a co-op or, at one time or another, customers.

HealthPartners is a co-op. The organic milk you buy at the grocery store likely came from Organic Valley, the Wisconsin-based co-op that's on track to do $700 million in sales this year. Depending on where you live, the electricity powering your home or business might be coming from Maple Grove-based Great River Energy, a cooperative that is itself owned by 28 co-ops.

REI, the popular outdoor retailer based in Seattle? Co-op.

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Two years after a devastating earthquake rocked Haiti, one cooperative organization is receiving support through a program funded by cooperatives around the globe. Several natural disasters, including the January 2010 earthquake, have dramatically affected Haiti’s agricultural production, which contributes 25 percent of gross domestic product in the country. The program will provide post-disaster business support to the Federation of Cocoa Cooperatives in Northern Haiti (FECCANO). Through technical and business assistance, the National Cooperative Business Association’s CLUSA International program will assist FECCANO in improving its cocoa processing capacity, strengthening its governance and management capacity and establishing relationships with similar cooperative organizations. 

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