Social Economy in the EU

Social Economy in the EU

Karel Vanderpoorten

European Commission – DG GROW Social Economy, Clusters & entrepreneurship

A fair share…

• The European social economy provides: • - over 13.6 million paid jobs in the EU • - equivalent to about 6.3% of the working population of the EU-28 • - more than 82.8 million volunteers, equivalent to 5.5 million full-time workers • - more than 232 million members of cooperatives, mutuals and similar entities • And the 'social economy' covers over 2.8 million organisations in the EU

Social Economy in the EU After the Communication on a Social Business Initiative (2011), new engagements since 2015: • Council Conclusions on the Social Economy (2015) together with: EP resolutions, EESC opinions, CoR opinions; • GECES report and recommendations (October 2016); • "Start up and Scale-up" Initiative (October 2016);

• Series of actions coordinated by the launch of an Internal Task Force between different services (January 2017).

Side event to the European Social summit - 16 November 2017 "What role for SOCIAL ECONOMY in the future of work?"

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- Potential of Social Economy to create growth and sustainable jobs - Role of cooperative societies and on how to create favourable ecosystems for Social Economy

Social Economy and Social Enterprises going forward

Five pillars of the GECES Report • Implementation of actions scheduled for 2017-2018 by the scale up and start-up initiative. • Five pillars to be developed: 1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

Access to finance; Access to markets; Improving framework conditions; Social innovation, technologies and new business models; International dimension.

Pillar 1: Access to finance To implement this pillar the Commission used the EFSI & EaSI program to develop and stimulate the use of different financial instruments and grands such as: • • • •

Guarantee schemes Capacity building investments Equity for social impact pilots Projects grants to develop markets (social finance intermediaries) • Operating grants for EU-level networks; • Grants to reduce transaction costs of financial intermediaries for small investments / microfinance.

Pillar 2: Access to markets Improve market conditions: • Implementing the revised rules on qualitative public procurement • Reinforcing the cooperation between traditional enterprises and social economy enterprises Study on best practices, a high-level conference on the topic mid-2018.

• Identifying entry points for social enterprise/social innovation in Corporate Social Responsibility policy and related actions.

• Stimulating cross-border activities for social economy and social enterprises.

Pillar 3: Improving framework conditions Support building regulatory frameworks such as: • Guidelines, policy tools and mapping studies to assist Member States in developing regulatory frameworks; • Promoting social economy clusters & statistics in different Member States; • Two Pilot Projects towards cooperatives: - "Transfer of businesses under form of cooperatives"; - "Reduction of young unemployment and the setting up of cooperatives".

Pillar 4: Social innovation, technologies and new business models Initiate social innovation and new business models:

• Reflecting on the use and impact of new technologies regarding: o 'Sharing Economy' Start-up initiative – Financing the future of European Entrepreneurship; o Support for social innovation (Social Innovation Challenge Platform (matchmaker + re-granting for projects) o May 2017: Stakeholders conference "New technologies and digitalisation: opportunities and challenges for the social economy & social enterprises". ďƒ Followed by a tender in October 2017

Pillar 5: International dimension • Promoting social economy and social enterprises in: - neighbourhood/enlargement policies and programmes; - development policies and SDG's (sustainable development goals) - International Finance Organisations and Donor Communities • Including the role of social economy and social enterprises in our Economic Diplomacy - P.e.: UNTFSSE, ILGSSE, G20, G7, ILO …

Legal framework – EU level Since 1980’s attempts to develop commonly accepted statutes for social economy - - Cooperatives, mutuals, foundations and associations.

- - No agreement MS – Council - - Only a statute for co-operative societies (2003) - - With the SBI a definition for Social Enterprises was introduced together with 11 main actions.

Thank you!

Follow us on Twitter! @SocEntEU #EU4SocEnt #GECES And join our LinkedIn Community page: "EU for Social Economy & Social Enterprises"

Website: https://ec.europa.eu/growth/sectors/social-economy