Coops are used to support local and regional communities when State n Federal services are insufficient.
Community coops that support financial development at the micro neighborhood level.
Korea:
(“A Gye (계, also known as Gyemoim) is a traditional Korean cooperative finance and savings club. Small communities or groups of friends pool fixed monthly dues into a common pot, and each member takes a turn collecting the entire lump sum on a rotating basis.”)
India chit fund.
(“A Chit Fund is a traditional Indian cooperative finance and rotating savings club. Members pool fixed monthly contributions into a common pot, which is auctioned off or awarded to a single member each month.”)
Caribbean n Africa Susu or Esusu.
(*An Esusu (or Susu) is a traditional rotating savings and credit association (ROSCA) practiced across West Africa and the Caribbean. It relies entirely on trust and community bonds to help members save money, access interest-free credit, and bypass formal banking systems.")
Various regions of Africa use different terms.
Mexico n Central America it’s called Tanda, Rifa, or Cundina..
These are group based trust networks going back centuries.
This is somewhat reminiscent of Grameen bank concept that won a Nobel… 20 years ago.
(" The 2006 Nobel Peace Prize was jointly awarded to Dr. Muhammad Yunus and Grameen Bank for their pioneering work in developing the microcredit concept. [1, 2] ")
Claude says:
(" Ancient/indigenous traditions: Susu, tontine, hui, chit funds, gameya, stokvel, tanda, iddir. These are rotating savings and credit associations (ROSCAs) with roots going back centuries, built on kinship, market, or neighborhood trust networks — no bank involved, no interest in the formal sense.
Post-Grameen (1970s–90s onward): VSLAs, SHGs, and formal “solidarity group” microfinance institutions. Grameen’s innovation (1976 pilot, 1983 formalized) was taking the logic of group-based trust lending and layering it with: written records, staff-managed loans, interest rates, and links to formal banking/regulatory systems. NGOs like CARE then explicitly adapted village-level ROSCA culture into the VSLA model in Niger in 1991, spreading it across Africa. *)
ralph
