The Co-operative, Group has announced additional funding for a scheme designed to support a new co-operative business every day in 2011. The Group has announced a 50% increase in its funding for The Co-operative Enterprise Hub, which was Iaunched in Wales at the Senedd last year – to £7.5m.
It has set a target of nurturing more than 350 enterprises across the UK throughout the year to create and grow thriving and sustainable community-based co-operatives.
Peter Marks, Chief Executive of The Co-op Group, said: “With flaws exposed in traditional business models, more and more people are recognising that there is an alternative which enables them to take a lead, and have a say in the running of businesses and services important to their lives.
“The co-operative model offers an alternative way to do business and provides a robust approach to enterprise that can help to restore a lost sense of community cohesion, and can contribute to the rebuilding of a more balanced and sustainable UK economy.”
The Co-operative Enterprise Hub operates through a central website with a network of regional co-operative development specialists offering advice, training and guidance. In Wales the contract is managed by the Wales Co-operative Centre and delivered by the consultancy.coop, a co-operative of specialist business consultants.
For more information visit: www.co-operative.coop/enterprisehub or https://www.cooperatives-wales.coop/?page_id=273
To contact the consultancy.coop visit: www.consultancy.coop
