China Invites CU Reps

GUIZHOU PROVINCE, China - A 14-member group representing the World Council and its board members will travel to China during June as part of a study group. The group will be led by WOCCU's Chief Operating Officer, Brian Branch, and Ralph Swoboda, its consultant on China. During the trip, credit union CEOs from the United States and Canada will study the rural credit cooperative (RCC) system and provide initial training on model credit union building.

WOCCU reported that the Chinese government officials and regulators invited World Council of Credit Unions (WOCCU) to spearhead rural credit cooperative (RCC) reform in one of the poorest provinces of China during a recent visit to the country. The Chinese government established a legal framework to allow for the existence of credit unions at the end of 2006. During that trip, Branch, Swoboda and WOCCU CEO Pete Crear spent a week with government officials, RCC representatives and regulators from the People's Bank of China (PBOC) and the China Regulatory Banking Commission (CRBC) to begin planning RCC reform in the southwest Guizhou Province-one of the poorest and least developed in China.

WOCCU reported that the All-China Federation of Trade Unions (ACFTU), China's only national trade union federation and the largest trade union in the world, has also sought World Council's assistance in a separate initiative to form a credit union for its 134-million members. ACFTU is a voluntary trade union that represents more than 1.7 million primary trade union organizations of China's working class.