OECS Credit Union Summit opens in Dominica

Members of credit unions from across the OECS have gathered in Dominica for the tenth Credit Union Summit.

The summit is being held under the theme “Co-operatives the Engine of Growth in Tough Economic Times.”

Addressing the summit’s opening, president of the Dominica Co-operative Societies League Ltd (DCSL), Cletus Joseph, said the theme was chosen in keeping with the celebration of International Year of Co-operatives as designated by the United Nations.

“This theme provides the opportunity on the one hand and challenges us on the other, as co-operators, to renew our efforts at ensuring that these principles upon which we have been built, are always kept as a beacon, at the forefront of our endeavors, since they have led not just to our survival, but tremendous success,” he said.

Joseph told participants, that the tenets of the movement have ensured that the Co-operative business model performs sustainably through the many economic depressions, world wars, ravages of climatic adversities and other man made or natural phenomena. “Co-operativism is indeed a resilient model,” he noted. “It has proven to be resilient and successful in the tumultuous global economic crisis that has plagued every major economy during the past five years 2008 to 2012.”

He said the cooperative model is still useful in the world today. “Today, the Cooperative Business Model is perhaps just as useful as it was 150 years ago, given the modern unique challenges facing us,” Joseph said.

Five credit unions across the OECS are being represented at the summit.

Some of the topics to be reviewed are:

-Money Laundering Prevention Act;
-Youth in Co-operatives;
-The Harmonized OECS Co-operative Act;
-The Co-operative Principles;
-The role of  the Producers Co-operatives in the Economic Development of the OECS.