Mondragon University trains Colombian growers and farmers in cooperativism and social economics during the peace process.

Mondragon University trains Colombian growers and farmers in cooperativism and social economics during the peace process.

As an invited guest of the National University of Colombia, social agents of the country, and Wageningen University (Holland), Mondragon University has participated in a mission to transmit concepts about cooperativism and social economics to growers and farmers throughout Colombia during the Colombian peace process. This collaboration is taking place in the present post-war period in Colombia, a time at which the social, educational, and economic agents of Colombia are trying to develop their own model of growth and development based on social economics and including the growers and farmers of the country, in order to achieve both development and benefit for all citizens.

For one week, both in the capital city of Bogota and in agricultural areas of the country that have been immersed in a conflict that lasted five decades before the Peace Agreement was signed, Mondragon University has been teaching representatives of the farmers of the whole country, who represent nearly all the farmers from the different areas of Colombia, what cooperativism is. The purpose of this exercise is for Colombian growers and farmers to learn what is involved in this model of social economics, its values and its principles, with an eye to its future organization in a time of peace. Once they become familiar with the characteristics of cooperativism, they will carry out a process of internal reflection in order to decide what model they want to implement in their country.

Advanced cooperativism

Colombia already has its own framework of cooperativism, but its context is far from that in which the cooperative movement has developed and operates in the Basque Country. The purpose of the present collaboration is therefore to help Colombians with the implementation in Colombia of a model closer to social economics, taking Basque cooperativism as a reference since it is one of the most advanced and developed examples of cooperativism in the world, and a clear example of success at the international level.

The goal of the political, economic, and educational agents of Colombia is to achieve the implementation in Colombia of an economy and a model of development that seek a common economic and social interest through principles like collective responsibility, mutual support, effort, equality, solidarity, equity, and direct democracy, among others.

The cooperative movement of MONDRAGON is studied as a successful case in many countries in the world. The university, which is integrated in the MONDRAGON Corporation, offers a degree aimed at transmitting knowledge about the cooperative world, the Master’s Degree in Social Economy and the Cooperative Company. With this degree, the university introduces students to cooperativism, and has worked in different countries to explain the cooperative model and its implications.