Atlantic Cluster

Project A1 - Co-operative Sustainability and Planning Practices

Project A1 will contribute to the area of social accounting and sustainability reporting and planning within co-operatives. It will also contribute to co-operative theory, especially as regards the nature of the "co-operative difference" and the assessment of the impacts of co-operatives on their stakeholders (including their communities).

During the first stages of the research, member co-operatives of Co-op Atlantic (retail food stores) will pilot the "Co-operative Social and Environmental Accounting and Reporting Tool" which, during a previous research project, they have helped to develop. The practices and indicators that make up this tool are rooted in the co-operative principles and values as approved by the membership of the International Co-operative Alliance (1995).

The project team will work with the pilot co-operatives to:

• Assess their experience with the tool;
• Support their efforts to measure their performance (engaging stakeholders in the process);
• Study the various ways the results feed into strategic planning and ongoing operations and governance.

Working with the pilot co-operatives, the project team will also make improvements to the tool, and develop a manual to guide its use. Capacity building objectives are built into the project - the tool and accompanying manual, and the work of the team (including Co-op Atlantic and the pilot co-operatives), will contribute to increasing the capacity of team members and of Co-op Atlantic's member co-operatives to implement sustainability assessment and reporting, integrating this into their strategic planning and communication initiatives.

For Co-op Atlantic and its members, the project will provide indicators and measurable benchmarks emphasizing the co-operative differences in their member stores and framed in terms of the co-operative principles and values. It is anticipated that this will contribute to the effectiveness of the stores' governance and management planning and control systems by incorporating non-financial as well as financial measures, and providing a strategic management tool that incorporates stakeholder engagement processes.

For stores which produce a Co-operative Sustainability and Planning Report, it will be possible to summarize, benchmark and improve their economic, social and environmental performance, and to communicate the qualities that make them effective co-operative businesses. Using the completed reports, and aggregating the data, we will also be able to build a profile of the co-operatives' practices and impacts in the Atlantic region.

In subsequent stages, we will broaden our investigations to explore factors that increase or impede the likelihood that sustainability reporting and planning will be embedded in positive ways across the organization. This will allow us to make suggestions for how co-operatives can best be supported in such initiatives. Further, by comparing the publicly-available reports of co-operatives and investor-owned companies, we will analyse the extent to which sustainability reporting reveals consistent ‘co-operative differences', including whether or not they reveal differences in impacts for co-operatives compared with CSR-oriented investor-owned businesses.

For more information on the Co-operative Social and Environmental Accounting and Reporting Tool, click here to download a 30-minute powerpoint presentation with audio (download may take several minutes).

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