Zones

With the restoration of democracy in 1990 and promulgation of a new Cooperative Act in 1992, there has been resurgence in the cooperative movement in Nepal. This is evidenced by the fact that the number of registered cooperatives has grown to 9362 ( Statistics on Nepalese Cooperative Societies & Unions, Government of Nepal, Ministry of Agriculture & Cooperatives, Department of Cooperatives, 2007, July 9) as of the record up to  April 13, 2007, compared to 830 in 1990. With the increase in number, cooperatives have diversified their involvement in micro & medium level enterprises. Indeed cooperative sector is flourishing one of the largest private sector business enterprises in Nepal.

 One of the factors that have contributed to the rapid expansion in both the number and the enterprise coverage of cooperatives is the new policy and legal regime allowing grassroots based spontaneous initiatives of communities to organize themselves into cooperatives for doing business and serving the communities. This is in contrast to the government led and government directed cooperatives prior to 1990.

 There are presently nearly 9,362 primary cooperatives and these are federated into a number of subject-specific cooperative unions at the district level (72), district cooperative unions (49), central cooperative union (5), and 1 national cooperative bank. The National Cooperative Federation is the apex level representative body of all the cooperatives at the national level. Among the five central level cooperative unions, there is one each for dairy, coffee, fruits and vegetables, consumers, and savings and credit.

A total of 1.2 million people are actively involved in cooperative organizations. Out of this, women cover nearly one-third percent out of the total membership. Total share capital is 960 million. Total accumulated savings of the cooperatives is estimated to Rs 18 billion, outstanding loan is 24 billion. More than 16 thousand people are employed in the cooperatives.

 The contribution of the cooperative sector to gross domestic product is estimated around 1% while their contribution in the financial sector is 7 %.

Number of Higher Level Cooperative

Number of Primary Cooperative