The pilot edition of Coopathon in April 2018 saw over 100+ young persons from across the southern Indian states compete at the country’s premier institute - Indian Institute of Management, Kozhikode.
With a vision to highlight the role of co-operatives in the emerging economy, ICA Asia and Pacific organised Coopathon 2.0 on 29-30 January 2019 in Delhi, to source sustainable, innovative and technologically-enabled solutions to address various challenges in the co-operative sector. The activity was an initiative to provide youth with a platform to solve some of pressing problems that co-operatives face in their daily operations, inculcate a culture of innovation and problem solving and in the process, expose them to the values-based form of enterprise model. The participants had the opportunity to work on challenges faced by the cooperative movement, thus helping the sector to hire the best minds from across the nation.
About 10 teams from major cooperative and development management institutes across the country came as the final participants for Coopathon 2.0.
Team Tech-Coop(s) bagged the first prize by coming up with an online platform intended to act as a bridge between co-operatives and private companies through which private companies can invest in co-operatives under the head of Corporate Social Responsibility. Team Techmites was the first runner up which attempted the problem given by Buldana Urban Coop Credit Society (BUCCS) and came up with a prototype to streamline warehouse transactions intended to maintain a database and save work-hours of different stakeholders. The 2nd Runner up, Team Saksham took a shot at the ICA-AP's problem statement for developing an online platform where young people who wish to form co-operatives will find mentors, funding agencies and knowledge repository required to take ahead the cooperative movement. Finally Team Go-Getters got an honorable mention for attempting Vasundhara Agri Horti Producer Co. Ltd's problem statement.
You can read a more detailed report about Coopathon 2.0 including information on the problem statements provided to participants by clicking here
