NEW YORK-The Committee for the Promotion and Advancement of Cooperatives [COPAC] says it will on July 11, 2023, hold a virtual Voluntary National Review Lab [ VNR Lab] in support of the High-Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development.
The VNR Lab event will take place at the United Nations headquarters in a hybrid format and is also an occasion to commemorate the 2023 International Day of Cooperatives.
The International Day of Cooperatives is celebrated annually on the first Saturday of July by the cooperative movement worldwide and the theme for this year is Cooperatives: Partners for Accelerated Sustainable Development. It is an occasion to show how the cooperative way of working, inspired by the cooperative values and principles, has the accomplishment of the Sustainable Development Goals [SDGs] as part of its DNA.
Being one of the world’s oldest and largest business networks, the cooperative movement was the first group of enterprises worldwide to endorse the SDGs and be recognized as a partner in achieving these goals.
“As the international community will hold an SDG summit in September 2023 seeking ways to accelerate progress, it is thus a real key moment to highlight cooperatives as a solution in advancing the achievement of the SDGs and accelerating the recovery from COVID-19,” COPAC says in a concept note.
According to COPAC, the VNR event will allow countries that include cooperatives in their voluntary national presentations to exchange experiences with participants [including countries having not yet included cooperatives in their VNRs] for mutual learning and to have a deeper discussion on supporting cooperatives as sustainable and successful enterprises that are vehicles for achieving many SDGs.
As natural vehicles of collaborative partnership and prosperity for all, cooperatives contribute to economic, social, and environmental sustainability across regions and economic sectors. It is inherent among them to safeguard community relations, enhance local resources, advocate social responsibility, and adopt sustainable and long-term business practices.
The International Day of Cooperatives was officially proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly in 1995 and is celebrated annually. The aim of the International Day of Cooperatives [#CoopsDay] is to increase awareness of cooperatives.
The event underscores the contributions of the cooperative movement to resolving the major problems addressed by the United Nations and to strengthening and extending the partnerships between the international cooperative movement and other actors. Since 1995, the International Cooperative Alliance [ICA] and the United Nations, through COPAC, have jointly set the theme for the celebration of #CoopsDay.
COPAC is a multi-stakeholder partnership of global public and private institutions that champions and supports people-centred and self-sustaining cooperative enterprises as leaders in sustainable development.
It consists of ICA, the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs [UNDESA], the International Labour Organization [ILO,] the International Trade Center [ITC], the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations [FAO], and the United Nations Research Institute for Social Development [UNRISD].
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