Cooperative

Jaipur’s Carpet Weavers Are Disappearing — A Cooperative Might Be the Only Thing That Can Save Them

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Jaipur's Carpet Weavers Are Disappearing — A Cooperative Might Be the Only Thing That Can Save Them

In a narrow lane behind Jaipur’s Sanganer bypass, Ramlal Meena sits before a wooden loom that his grandfather built in 1971. His fingers move mechanically, knotting wool into a pattern he has repeated for thirty years. But the order pinned to his wall — a single 6×9 carpet for a Delhi exporter — is the … Read more

India’s Cooperative Fisheries Sector Is Worth ₹28,000 Crore and Nobody Is Talking About It

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India's Cooperative Fisheries Sector Is Worth ₹28,000 Crore and Nobody Is Talking About It

On a grey monsoon morning in Alappuzha, Kerala, a woman named Leela pulls the day’s catch tally from a worn register. Her Thanneermukkom Fisherwomen Cooperative Society — 340 members strong — collectively earned ₹1.7 crore last financial year. That figure would be unremarkable for a dairy cooperative in Gujarat. But for a fisheries cooperative in … Read more

How Kerala’s Kudumbashree Cooperative Network Became the Largest Women-Run Cooperative in Asia

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How Kerala's Kudumbashree Cooperative Network Became the Largest Women-Run Cooperative in Asia

In a small rented room in Alappuzha district, a woman named Sreelatha once counted ₹47 in weekly savings collected from nine neighbours. That was 2001. Today, that same neighbourhood group manages a catering micro-enterprise turning over ₹12 lakh annually. I find her story remarkable not because it is unique — but because it has been replicated approximately 3.06 lakh times across every single ward in Kerala. This is the quiet, staggering mathematics of what cooperative mobilisation can achieve when women hold the ledger.

I have spent years covering India‘s cooperative sector for IICTF, and no model has fascinated me more than Kudumbashree — a name that translates to “prosperity of the family” in Malayalam. With over 4.5 million women members as of 2026, it is not merely Kerala’s pride; it is the single largest women-run cooperative network anywhere in Asia. Yet most Indians outside Kerala have only a vague sense of what it actually does or how it works. That gap deserves closing.

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The Coconut Cooperative of Thrissur That Took on Multinational FMCG Companies — and Won

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The Coconut Cooperative of Thrissur That Took on Multinational FMCG Companies — and Won

In the summer of 2019, a coconut farmer named Rajan in Irinjalakuda, Thrissur district, sold his entire seasonal harvest — roughly 12,000 coconuts — to a local copra trader for ₹5.80 per nut. After deducting transport and labour, he pocketed about ₹58,000 for six months of work. Forty kilometres away, a bottle of virgin coconut oil carrying a cooperative label from his own district was retailing at ₹430 per litre in a Kochi supermarket. The arithmetic was cruel and simple: the farmer who grew the coconut earned a fraction of what the processor who branded it took home. That gap — between the palm and the shelf — is what one cooperative federation in Thrissur decided to collapse.

I first encountered this story while reporting on Kerala’s cooperative ecosystem for IICTF, and what I found challenged nearly every assumption I had about cooperatives being slow, bureaucratic, and incapable of competing in modern FMCG markets. This is the account of how a network of coconut producer societies in Thrissur built a supply chain, launched branded products, entered supermarket shelves dominated by Marico’s Parachute and Dabur, and actually grew market share — all without a single venture capital rupee.

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How to Get Government Grants for Cooperative Societies in India

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How to Get Government Grants for Cooperative Societies in India

Thousands of cooperative societies across India leave crores of rupees in government grants unclaimed every year simply because they don’t know how to apply. I’ve spent years studying the cooperative ecosystem in India, and I can tell you that the funding infrastructure is remarkably generous — if you know where to look and how to … Read more

Urban Cooperative Banks Are Using AI to Catch Fraud Before It Happens — Here’s How

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Urban Cooperative Banks Are Using AI to Catch Fraud Before It Happens — Here's How

Last March, a branch manager at a mid-sized urban cooperative bank in Pune, Maharashtra noticed something strange — or rather, the bank’s new software noticed it for him. A cluster of 14 transactions, each just under the ₹50,000 reporting threshold, had been flagged automatically overnight. The amounts originated from three different accounts but routed funds … Read more

How AMUL Built a ₹72,000 Crore Cooperative Empire

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How AMUL Built a ₹72,000 Crore Cooperative Empire

A tiny milk cooperative born out of a farmer revolt against exploitative middlemen in 1946 now commands annual revenues exceeding ₹72,000 crore. I find this story endlessly fascinating because it proves that millions of small dairy farmers, when organized under a cooperative structure, can outperform multinational corporations and reshape an entire nation’s food economy. The … Read more

The APCO Cooperative That Has Been Selling Handlooms Since 1953 — and Just Went Online

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The APCO Cooperative That Has Been Selling Handlooms Since 1953 — and Just Went Online

In the weaving hamlet of Mangalagiri, about 30 kilometres from Vijayawada, a 58-year-old weaver named Suresh spends nine hours a day on a pit loom producing cotton sarees with the distinctive nizam border his family has woven for three generations. He earns approximately ₹8,000 per month — and until last year, his only reliable buyer … Read more

Amul and IFFCO Are Selling Direct to Your Door Now — The Cooperative Middleman Is Disappearing

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Amul and IFFCO Are Selling Direct to Your Door Now — The Cooperative Middleman Is Disappearing

Last month, a dairy farmer named Ramesh Chaudhary in Kalol, Gujarat, opened an app on his phone and ordered a 50-kg bag of IFFCO Nano DAP — delivered to his doorstep within 48 hours, no dealer visit required. Two kilometres away, his neighbour’s wife ordered a carton of Amul Gold milk, Amul dark chocolate, and … Read more

Powerloom Cooperative vs Independent Weaver: Income Comparison

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Powerloom Cooperative vs Independent Weaver: Income Comparison

I’ve spent years studying the economics behind India‘s decentralized textile sector, and one question keeps surfacing among weavers, policymakers, and cooperative advocates alike — does joining a powerloom cooperative actually put more money in a weaver’s pocket than working independently? The answer is more nuanced than most people assume, and the income gap between these … Read more