Portugal

Responding to challenges and existing knowledge gaps facing the cooperative movement, this mapping research seeks to provide exhaustive information on cooperatives around the world.

This is achieved through a process jointly conducted by the ICA and its four regional offices – Cooperatives of the Americas, Cooperatives Europe, ICA Africa, and ICA Asia-Pacific – using a common methodology, designed with the support of external experts from the European Research Institute on Cooperative and Social Enterprises (Euricse).

Each office collected the input of ICA members present in the countries within its geographic area, by using a common questionnaire, and completing it with relevant national statistics, in order to obtain a picture of the national situation. As a result, the data above is collected following two strategies: 1) a survey targeting ICA cooperative members 2) collecting national statistics already available in the country. The numbers above provide aggregated data from ICA members on the number of cooperatives, as well as the number of cooperative employees and memberships in the country. More methodological information is available in the full report. In Portugal, the data is collected for the reference year 2017.

Mapping out cooperatives in each country provides a more precise picture of the cooperative context at national and regional levels, enhances the movement's visibility, networking, partnerships opportunities, as well as advocacy, and empowers cooperators by providing tools for positive change.

This webpage presents a snapshot of the research results for Portugal. For more information and the full research results, you can download the highlights and the report by clicking on the links above.

Modern cooperative values were disseminated throughout Portugal from England by means of the 1848 Revolutions. Like the UK from where the Rochdale Pioneers emerged, early consumer coops in Portugal were rooted in neighbourhood networks and in the growing industrial belts of Lisbon and Porto. Portugal was the second country in Europe to legally recognise Cooperatives with the Basilar Law of 1867 which was introduced in the context of the liberal philanthropic movement of the time. In the years that followed, and especially during the First World War, the cooperative movement experienced increasing politicisation, in line with the trend of increased state intervention in the economic and social spheres.

Following growth of the Portuguese cooperative sector between the mid-1970s to the 1990s, more recent years saw a period in which significant cooperative failures took place, especially in more competitive markets such as the agri-food sector.The modern-day cooperative sector in Portugal continues to be dominated by agricultural cooperatives which in this report made up around a third of the total.  Other important sectors include banking, wholesale and retail trade and education.

Portugal counts 4 member organisations of the ICA and the regional offices (2 full ICA / Cooperatives Europe members, 1 full Cooperatives Europe member and 1 Cooperatives Europe associate member). 

Members of Cooperatives Europe and ICA:

-Cooperativa António Sérgio para a Economia Social, CASES is a full ICA member and the national apex organisation for Portuguese cooperatives, who they represent in public and abroad.

-Confederaçao Cooperativa Portuguesa, CONFECOOP is a full ICA member and the national confederation representing non-agricultural cooperatives in Portugal.

Members of Cooperatives Europe:

-Confederaçao Nacional de Cooperators Agricolas e do Crédito Agricola de Portugal, CCRL CONFAGRI is a full member and national confederation of Portuguese agricultural and agricultural credit cooperatives.

-Uninorte is an associate Cooperatives Europe member and is a member-based network that connects and supports local development in Portugal

In Portugal the research questionnaire was distributed to and completed by 1 member organisation in the country. The data collected was for the reference year 2017.

CASES - an ICA member - collected data from over 1400 cooperatives in the country, with a total number of memberships of 406,302, and a total number of 24,346 employees.

User cooperatives, producer cooperatives, worker cooperatives and multi-stakeholder cooperatives are all present in Portugal.

Its member organisations are active in the several sectors, including Agriculture, Banking, Wholesale and Retail Trade, Education and Construction. The graphics above provide more information.