The UN Task Force on Social and Solidarity Economy (UNTFSSE) held its 36th regular meeting

The 36th UNTFSSE meeting was virtually held on 27 July 2021 and brought together 35 participants from four UN member organizations (ILO, UNRISD, UNDESA, UNDP-ART), twelve observer organizations (CIRIEC, EURICSE, Catalyst2030, DIESIS, GSEF, Euclid Network, Social Economy Europe, SSE International Forum, RIPESS, CSEND, EESC and ICA) and two resource persons.

The meeting started by welcoming DIESIS, as a new observer in the UNTFSSE. A discussion around priority objectives of the UNTFSSE work plan, including the process leading to a UN resolution on SSE was tabled. Updates on the ongoing and future activities of the Knowledge Hub were shared, including information on the organization of the second UNTFSSE conference scheduled for fall 2022. Updates on the participation of the UNTFSSE and members in the Pact for Impact initiative were also presented.

During the meeting preliminary results of the mapping initiative on exploring the existing training/sensitization curricula on SSE were presented by ITC-ILO. A new area of work around “SSE innovation: The funding challenge” was discussed. RIPESS also led a discussion on new regional activities of the UNTFSSE.

The meeting continued with the presentation of the current communication strategy of the task force, including the tools on sharing relevant member information especially pertaining to events, projects and publications.

As part of updates from members, UNDESA shared its approach and work related to cooperatives and wider SSE, and provided other members with information on the recent work and publications on SSE.

Common synergies for future events were also discussed, in particular within the framework of GSEF2021 and CIRIEC research conference.