Namrata Sharma

Nepal, like any other developing nation, has been experimenting with various programmes and projects aimed at poverty eradication. One of the most successful projects that Nepal Government implemented as its poverty alleviation strategy was Small Farmer’s Development Project in the early 70s with soft loan from the Asian Development Bank channelled through the Agriculture Development Bank of Nepal. Initially, this project was seen as a failure, but turned into a successful model after formulation of cooperatives.

Knowledge boost
This project targeted the small farmers of Nepal to increase their knowledge on productive farming by forming groups mainly of men farmers. Later, it started having both mixed groups and women only groups. After several experiments these groups were coagulated into mixed sex cooperatives and women only cooperatives. Most of the cooperatives were multipurpose while some were Saving and Credit Cooperatives (SACCOs) with license from Nepal Rastra Bank, the central bank, to collect savings from members and mobilise it into loans and other financial services for them. These cooperatives can now be found all over the country, and have been linked with Small Farmer’s Development Bank for external finance to improve their agricultural produces.
During the mid-1990, I was involved a lot with the SACCOs movement in Nepal as a team leader of a project implemented by a Canadian Organisation with head office in Montreal, Quebec and regional office in Kathmandu. The cooperative movement in Canada is a social and economic movement that started in the middle of the 19th century and continues till today.
From 1815 to 1850, there was an inflow of over 800,000 immigrants into Canada mainly of British and Iris origins. This is known as the Great Migration of Canada. After the boom of the industrial revolution, there was a big population growth in Europe and people started migrating. North America, including Canada and the USA, was a desired destination. History has shown that as industries grow, small producers start losing their jobs. Similar situation occurred in Canada, too. The crafts system located mainly in homes in villages was disrupted as large industries started emerging. People began moving from rural areas to over-crowded urban settings where industries were being set up. This, actually, created a large number of unemployment among the rural small crafts people. People coming into Canada from Europe brought with them skills of setting up a cooperative system and that is how the cooperative movement commenced in Canada. The British cooperative movement can be traced back to the 1800. The first attempt of establishing new marketing cooperatives in Canada was made around 1840s which went through a phase of struggle failure and finally the first recorded consumer cooperative was organised at Stellarton Nova Scotia in 1864.
Nova Scotia is Canada's second smallest province in terms of area. It is a Peninsula surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean. This remote and enchanting place may be very far from the Himalayan Kingdom of Nepal. However, the place and particularly the Coady Institute of St. Xaviers University situated there, together with one of the former lecturers Anthony Scoggins is very well known to many in the cooperative movement in Nepal. There is a large contingent of graduates from Coady Institute who are actively involved in setting up exemplary cooperatives in Nepal.
Working with the Canadian team, particularly Scoggins, opened my eyes on how the Cooperative movements can actually be a movement to lift people out of poverty and develop a socio economic network to actually improve work and living status and the overall wellbeing of a community. This ultimately empowers each individual within that community.
During the mid-nineties till early 20s through several interactions in strengthening cooperatives, mainly women headed cooperatives, has been a fulfilling experience in my development work. I remember how I used a wooden box to make a presentation to a senior individual in Canada to raise funds to support 100 women’s cooperatives in rural Nepal. The reason I had to squat on the floor and use the box was because this organisation did not have a high-tech meeting room. They supported cooperatives all over Canada and also supported Canadian organisations who supported needy people in developing countries like Nepal. They did not waste money in modern equipment they hardly used. The Canadian orientation towards cooperation and growth is a concept that can be adopted to make people oriented enterprises a success within rural and urban settings.
With the establishment of Bakhan Multi-purpose Cooperative Institute in Chitwan in 1957, the cooperative movement commenced in Nepal. The first Cooperative Act was formulated in 1960 followed by the Agricultural Cooperative Act (Sajha Sahakari).
Since then the cooperative movement in the country has not been able to establish a people-oriented mass movement to uplift the socio economic situation of the country like in Canada and various European countries or closer to home like in Sri Lanka. It has rather been merged in several incidents of fraud and corruption. A current mismanagement is manifested by the Oriental Group of Companies who established a SACCO to generate public savings and later used it for the interest of the individual who set it up.

Exemplary work
There are several cases of exemplary work done by mixed and women only cooperatives, mainly in rural areas of Nepal, who have succeeded in uplifting not only their members but the overall communities where they exist. But these examples are limited to only a few cooperatives and have not swelled into mass movement.
Now that Nepal has moved into a federal system, the cooperative movement is the best way of uplifting people out of poverty and empowering each individual towards a dignified life. For this, social and political leaders need to abort their individual greed and think for the overall progress of the country.

(Namrata Sharma is a senior journalist and rights advocate and can be reached at namrata1964@yahoo.com Twitter handle: NamrataSharmaP)