In May 2021, the Parliament of Mongolia revised and approved the Law on Cooperatives of Mongolia. After many discussions and revisions, a favorable legal environment for the development of cooperatives is now built. Cooperatives have to conduct a development assessment every two years and providing management and information through cooperative associations is one of the many suggested changes approved by the parliament.
This change in the law results from the CDF Canada and its partner Mongolian Cooperative Training and Information Center (MCTIC) joint introduction and implementation of Development Ladder Assessment (DLA) in Mongolia during the INVEST project. This was implemented in 2020 to all cooperatives nationwide and was widely supported by members.
DLA helps to assess the strength of a cooperative and identifies areas for improvement. It is a participatory, capacity-building assessment tool for cooperatives, and the assessment under vision, governance and member engagement, management capacity and business development, and financial management.
“We are happy to see the changes in the coop law in Mongolia. Our work with MCTIC through INVEST helped to support 5000 beneficiaries while working with 23 cooperatives in 10 soums, reaching 59% of the active cooperatives in those soums,” said Ben Andre, Executive Director, CDF Canada. We look forward to working with MCTIC and the government of Mongolia.
During the announcement, the parliament approved the cooperative development funds to support small and medium-sized enterprises with soft loans. Furthermore, to intensify the cooperative movement, the government has announced the year 2022 as the year of Cooperatives.
Myagmar-Ochir Tsagaan, Executive Director, Mongolian Cooperative Training and Information Center, said, “We will closely work with the government and support the activities. Our past work with CDF Canada helped to work closer with cooperatives and strengthen them.”