This month our featured member is VICTO National Cooperative Federation and Development Center (VICTO National) from the Philippines, which has been a member of the Alliance since 2010.
The centre’s roots date back to the early 1960s when Canadian missionaries known as the Scarboro Fathers arrived in Southern Leyte, pioneering the co-op business model. Later, in 1970, co-op leaders founded a small training centre, which became known as VICTO.
The centre has grown into a federation of co-operative societies that provides various services to its members and other clients. These include education and training, consulting, project development, business incubation and enterprise development.
Employing 3,000 people, VICTO National brings together 500,000 individual members from 228 member societies. The federation is the only co-operative to have received the Benigno S. Aquino Foundation Award for its work in disadvantaged communities.
The federation is also one of the 100 co-operative bodies to make pledges via the Alliance’s Coopsfor2030 platform. To showcase its commitment to the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals, VICTO National pledged to enhance the entrepreneurial capacities of the members of the primary co-operatives through entrepreneurial training that cover management, financial, marketing and technical aspects of their livelihood or business through a gender perspective. It aims to have 80 affiliated co-operatives benefit from this training programme.
In addition, the federation committed to assist primary co-operatives to establish their gender and development programme to ensure full and effective participation and equal opportunities for leadership at all levels of decision making in political, economic and public life. Read more about VICTO National on their website.
Photo: VICTO national members at their annual AGM
