Growing an Inclusive Cooperative Economy

This is a national Policy Lab project in partnership with CCIN Associate Members from Stevenage Borough Council, Torbay Council, Preston City Council and affiliate member The Development Co-operative.

The ‘Growing an Inclusive Cooperative Economy’ Policy Lab established a steering group, meeting regularly and co-operating to share best practice and case studies on how to support the growth of the cooperative economy.

The steering group led by Oxford City Council delivered a test and learn pilot on cooperative mapping, looking at creating a directory of cooperatives in the city’s areas of deprivation. To promote co-op growth, this directory can be shared with large anchor institutions’ procurement teams
to prioritise when choosing suppliers to generate local, social value. After a directory was drafted, it was later developed as part of two wider initiatives
– Oxfordshire Inclusive Economy Partnership and Owned by Oxford – to become an initiative mapping community assets (see Oxford Case Study).

Torbay Council and Stevenage Borough Council were also both steering group members and delivered test and learn pilots in Torbay, focusing on care cooperative development, and in Stevenage, on social inclusion (see Torbay and Stevenage Case Studies).

Preston City Council and The Development Co-operative were both steering group members fulfilling an advisory role to the steering group and helping
to co-produce the test and learn pilots and collate learning and case studies.

Approaches included promoting community wealth-building and inclusive economy initiatives with a focus on embedding social value in procurement across anchor organisations; community mapping; financial support; advice and awareness-raising.