FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE CONTACT
October 5, 2011 Carolyn Hoover
dotCooperation LLC
+1 202.383.5453
DotCoop Announces Winners of 2011 Global Awards
Washington, DC USA - DotCoop, the sponsor of the .coop domain name, announced the winners of the 2011 dotCoop Global Awards for Cooperative Excellence.
The awards will be presented on November 18th 2011 at the International Co-operative Alliance General Assembly in Cancun, Mexico. The winning cooperatives will receive funds to assist in their participation in the meeting as part of their award.
“We received over 50 applications, from around the world and across cooperative sectors,” said Carolyn Hoover, chief executive officer of dotCoop. “We’re extremely pleased with the turnout of this year’s competition.” Hoover also expressed her thanks for the support provided this year by the Sponsors of the 2011 Global Awards and noted that information on the winners will be provided on a weekly basis from the www.globalawards.coop and www.coop websites and social media leading up to the presentation of the awards at the beginning of the last day of the ICA General Assembly.
The dotCoop Global Awards are given to those cooperatives and cooperative organizations who demonstrate a strong commitment to the cooperative business model. The DotCoop Global Awards judges also looked for co-ops whose mission and practices clearly demonstrate cooperative values, especially on their website.
The four winners are:
· La Equidad Seguros Organismo Cooperativo is an insurance cooperative in Colombia formed by two companies - La Equidad Seguros Generales and La Equidad Seguros de Vida. With more than 1,500,000 members, La Equidad Seguros OC was the winner in the category of large cooperatives with more than US$50 million in revenue or assets.
· The Malaysian National Cooperative Movement (ANGKASA) provides services to the members of the over 4,000 Malaysian cooperatives including insurance, educational loans and scholarships and an Islamic financial cooperative. ANGKASA was the winner in the medium category of cooperatives with between US$1 and $50 million in revenue or assets.
· The Co-operative Press – s.coop won in the category of small cooperatives with less than $1 million in revenue or assets. Presented a Special Recognition award in the 2009 competition, the Cooperative Press is an active participant in promoting cooperatives both in the UK and globally. The s.coop application has provided more than 162,000 short links which have been accessed by over 2.4 million people raising the profile of cooperatives around the world.
· In our new category for cooperative organizations, the Cooperativa Central de Crédito Urbano of Brazil was the winner. CECRED works to integrate, monitor and support the development of credit cooperatives in Brazil as well as to develop and improve products and services to meet the needs of its cooperative members.
Because of the number of outstanding entries, the international panel of judges chose to select the following outstanding cooperatives and cooperative organizations for Honorable Mention awards:
Large Cooperatives
CAC Dr. Manuel Zeno Gandia (Puerto Rico)
CROPP Cooperative (Organic Valley & Organic Prairie brands) (United States)
Medium Cooperatives
First Alternative Cooperative (United States)
Rung’eto Farmers Co-operative Society Limited (Kenya)
Small Cooperatives
Café l’Artère (Canada)
Atrium São Paulo Cooperativa de Profissionais de Informática e Assessoria Técnica (Brazil)
Organizational
Canadian Co-operative Association (Canada)
Singapore National Co-operative Federation (Singapore)
The next awards will be presented at the ICA General Assembly in 2013.
DotCooperation LLC (dotCoop) is the sponsor of the .coop domain and responsible for management of the .coop registry and verification of registrants. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of the National Cooperative Business Association, a U.S.-based national, cross-industry membership association.
International Co-operative Alliance is an independent, non-governmental association which unites, represents and serves co-operatives worldwide. Founded in 1895, ICA has 258 member organisations from 96 countries, representing approximately 1 billion individuals worldwide.