Cooperatives

The Government of Rwanda recognizes the central role that cooperatives have to play in promoting inclusive, sustainable development and economic transformation. Cooperatives are a unique form of self-help group, pooling members’ resources to achieve economies of scope and scale.

Cooperatives have a great poverty reduction potential. By pooling resources together in and keeping strong links to their local environments, cooperative members stand to benefit significantly from joining a cooperative. However, cooperatives are also facing many challenges :

• limited information and awareness of existing policies, laws, regulations and internal rules
• poor governance skills in cooperatives
• financial mismanagement, due to non-transparent decision-making process
• embezzlement, due to poor monitoring procedures
• lack of financial reporting and weak internal communication system
• threats, due to poor financial literacy and weak self-help of members
• interest of conflict creates disconnects between leadership and the membership base

The Rwanda Institute of Cooperatives, Entrepreneurship and Microfinance has developed many different modules to offer through training to hinder challenges affecting that sector :

Specific Cooperative modules :

• Effective Governance and Leadership
• Implementation of the new Cooperative Law 2021
• Internal Control and Audit
• Business Planning and Access to Finance
• Marketing

Cross-cutting modules :
• Local Taxation
• Business Model Canvas
• Savings Simulation
• Microbusiness Simulation
• Farmers Simulation

Visit RICEM training catalogue to find out more :