The ongoing pandemic and financial crisis have highlighted the importance of promoting social responsibility and developing skills in financial management. This is especially true for children and youth, who are more vulnerable. ICA-AP, in collaboration with Aflatoun International (AI) and ICA-Africa, with the support of the ICA-EU Partnership (#coops4dev) organised an inter-regional online workshop on capacity building on the theme, Social and Financial Education (SFE) for Cooperatives on 13th August 2020.

ICA-Africa and ICA-AP have signed a Memorandum of Understanding with AI to collaborate in empowering children and young people with social, financial, and entrepreneurial skills across the Africa and Asia-Pacific region. Working towards the same values and principles, the organisations believe that the collaboration can increase the capacity of youth in cooperatives, promote social and financial education for young people, promote entrepreneurship and employability and in the development of life skills. This collaboration builds upon the existing SFE program developed by AI and brings it to a larger audience in ICA’s network of member cooperatives in different sectors.

Dr. Sifa Chiyoge, Regional Director of ICA-Africa in her opening remarks informed the participants that AI programmes complement ICA’s vision. She commended Aflatoun for organising the workshop which was considered an important step in operationalising the MoU. It is expected to bring the best practices of social and financial education to the cooperative movements in Africa and Asia-Pacific. Dr. Sifa advised the participants to make use of the knowledge and information that they would receive from the workshop to better the cooperative services they provide to their members.

Mr. Hassan Mahtat, Director of National Policies and Strategies at AI started the first part of the workshop by introducing the organisation, its history, programme and its social franchise model. AI promotes life skills and financial education among the younger generation. Today it is active in over 100 countries collaborating with 345 organisations, including 38 government institutions. In 2007, ICA member National Confederation of Cooperatives (NATCCO) adapted and implemented the Aflatoun programme in the Philippines.

Ms. Hazel Ann, Programme Manager at NATCCO presents their experience with the Aflatoun programme in the Philippines.

The workshop also sought to engage participants in sharing and reflecting on how to best collaborate to bring social and financial education to the cooperative’s members. Below areas of collaboration were identified and brainstormed during the second part of the webinar:

Partnerships

The participants expressed interest in the social and financial education concept and discussed opportunities to become an Aflatoun partner and join its network. Below are some of the key outcomes:

• Consider and learn further from the NATCCO model, and encourage cooperatives to be a focal point to advocate for SFE in their countries;
• Develop partnerships to support the agenda of life skills, financial education and entrepreneurship within countries;
• Build national partnerships or network of partners based on the demographics served by cooperatives;
• Cooperatives to develop in country partnerships with universities, schools and other institutions to provide SFE.

Projects

The participants expressed interest to complement their approaches especially around entrepreneurship, school cooperatives and life skills development. Below are some of the key outcomes:

• Look and focus on projects aimed at financial inclusion, beneficiaries will need financial education to optimize results of the projects;
• Select entrepreneurship projects such as agribusinesses where the need for SFE is apparent, not only to build skills but also resilience in the agriculture sector;
• For cooperatives providing financial services to young people, SFE should be embedded to complement their services;
• Consider implementing SFE modules in projects on circular economy, girl’s education, etc.

Program Development and Expertise Exchange

Prospects of long term and collaborative partnership were brought up and proposed as a thematic area to address. Participants were invited to brainstorm around the idea of building innovative programmes or approaches that will bring together SFE as a concept with the cooperative model as a platform. Below are some of the key outcomes:

• Aflatoun and the regional ICA offices should collaborate to develop specific SFE programmes that will consider the cooperatives principles. This can be done on a national and/or regional level;
• SFE should be considered a pillar as part of the SDG implementation guidelines for cooperatives in primary and secondary education;
• The financial inclusion services or products provided by some of the cooperative’s members should look to include SFE as a learning service;
• Look at developing training and capacity building on facilitation programmes for cooperative’s members;
• Use Aflatoun and the ICA network to generate data, learn, share and disseminate;
• Joint events to provide space for sharing, learning and improving.

Mr. Roeland Monasch, CEO of AI thanks participants for making the time and their interest they in Aflatoun’s SFE.

Mr. Monasch, CEO of AI thanked the participants for their active and rich conversation and ideas. He reiterated Aflatoun’s interest to collaborate closely with ICA’s members in both Africa and Asia-Pacific. He also highlighted that the COVID-19 context has today served as a major wake up call for everyone involved in education and development; that resilience in economy, civic engagement, employment   is very important; and that all actors need to play a role in building that resilience.