The Argentine Ariel Guarco was re-elected as president of the International Cooperative Alliance, after beating the candidates from Australia and France.
Guarco obtained 495 votes over 164 from the Australian Melina Morrison and 160 from the Frenchman Jean Louis Bancel in the Assembly held in Seville, Spain.
The Argentine leader is also president of the Federation of Electricity and Public Services Cooperatives of the Province of Buenos Aires (Fedecoba) since 2008.
And, since 2011, he has been president of the Cooperative Confederation of the Argentine Republic (Cooperar).
He is also a member of the World Board of Directors of the International Cooperative Alliance since 2013 and Deputy Vice President of the ICA Cooperatives Regional Office for the Americas since 2014.
Author of the book “Argentine cooperativism: a hopeful look at the future”, he was elected president of the International Cooperative Alliance during the General Assembly of the International Cooperative Alliance held in 2017 in Malaysia.
“We have been through a difficult world together. The last few years, facing the worst global crisis unleashed by a pandemic, with enormous human, social and economic costs. And we have gone through them trying to make each one feel that the ACI is their home, the common home of all cooperative members, ”said Guarco after being re-elected.
On that, he added: “If there is a message to the world that we must give from here, it is that cooperation is possible. That dialogue is possible and that there are women and men from all continents and from all political systems who believe in cooperation, democracy and solidarity to build economy and build society”.
Founded in 1895 to promote the cooperative model, the International Cooperative Alliance is the spokesperson for cooperatives around the world.
Nowadays, the members of the three million cooperatives in the world represent at least 12% of humanity.
