SUSY videos showcase solidarity economy

The Co-operative College has released three short films that explore and celebrate ways of working that put people ahead of profit. Launched as part of the three-year Sustainable and Solidarity Economy (SUSY) project, the films look at what motivates the people involved in the solidarity economy, and how it benefits both the people employed in this way and those using their services and products.

SUSY has brought together 26 partners from 23 european territories, with the College and London-based global education charity Think Global being the UK partners. They are focusing on the solidarity economy in the north west of England, the north east of England, Greater London and the south east of England, in addition to the Indian territory of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands.

“All over the world – and in towns and communities close to you – people are providing services and products in ways that put people, not profit, first,” says the college. “These include not just well-known initiatives such as Fairtrade, but small-scale and local projects which encourage people to pool their resources and skills to work co-operatively and collaboratively. There is a name for this alternative way of doing business: the Social and Solidarity Economy.”

Care and Share Associates (CASA), a care provider owned by its employees, was chosen as the focus for the film highlighting the solidarity economy in the north west of England. Film-makers from the Co-operative College met employees and users of the Manchester branch of CASA, who describe how it was set up in response to the needs of its members, and explain the ways in which employee ownership influences the way the business is run.

In the north east of England, the College team visited Shared Interest, a co-operative based in Newcastle that uses the investments of individuals to make loans to Fairtrade producers around the world. These investors are members who have a say in the way Shared Interest is run and what businesses it funds. Their involvement empowers the investors, who feel that they are more than just donors, because they know what their money is used for and can stand for a position on Shared Interest’s board and committees. The film shows how and why Shared Interest works in this way, the way in which Shared Interest’s support differs from conventional kinds of loans, the impact of these loans on the producers, and what motivates investors to get involved in this way.

Associate Veena Nabar worked on behalf of the College in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, which are isolated from the mainland, to produce a film about Ellon Hinengo Co-operative Society. Ellon Hinengo is the only Central Tribal Co-operative Society in the islands. Its activities range from marketing agricultural produce to providing consumer goods and transport. The film shows how this has had a huge economic and social impact on the lives of the islands’ inhabitants, from providing the islands’ only petrol pump to rebuilding the island after the 2004 tsunami.

• All of the videos produced by SUSY partners across Europe can be watched on the SUSY YouTube channel, and range from a co-operative café in Prague to a recycling initiative in Brazil, as well as Iban weavers in Borneo, a project in France using recycled coffee grounds to grow mushrooms.