Cooperatives in social development A/RES/74/119 persons with disabilities and other vulnerable groups, so that they can empower people to transform their lives and communities positively and build inclusive societies, and to increase the meaningful participation of women and young people in cooperatives, in particular in their decision-making processes; 7. Invites Governments to strengthen efforts to enhance food security, nutrition and sustainable production and consumption and to focus efforts on smallholders and women farmers, as well as on agricultural and food cooperatives and farmers’ networks, supported by measures to improve access to markets and financial capital, create enabling domestic and international environments and strengthen collaboration across the many initiatives in this area, including regional initiatives; 8. Encourages Governments to promote access to information and communications technologies as a vital channel for collaboration and the expansion of cooperatives, especially in rural areas, working towards closing digital gender divides; 9. Also encourages Governments to intensify and expand the availability, accessibility and dissemination of evidence-based research on the operations and contribution of cooperatives, to develop a statistical framework for the systematic collection of comprehensive and disaggregated data on and the best practices of cooperative enterprises, taking into consideration available methodologies, such as the guidelines concerning statistics of cooperatives, in collaboration with all stakeholders, and to raise public awareness of the linkages between cooperatives and sustainable development, especially in the areas of social inclusion, decent employment creation, poverty eradication in all its forms and dimensions, inequality reduction, gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls, and peacebuilding; 10. Invites Governments, relevant international organizations, the specialized agencies and local, national and international cooperative organizations to continue to observe the International Day of Cooperatives annually, on the first Saturday of July, as proclaimed by the General Assembly in its resolution 47/90; 11. Invites Governments, in collaboration with the cooperative movement, to develop programmes aimed at enhancing the capacity-building of cooperatives, including by strengthening the organizational, management and financial skills of their members, while respecting the principles of gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls, and to introduce and support programmes to improve the access of cooperatives to new technologies; 12. Encourages Governments to take appropriate measures to adopt or develop legislation and policies that provide women with equal access to land and support women’s cooperatives and agricultural programmes and enable women’s cooperatives to benefit from public and private sector procurement processes and increase trade; 13. Requests the Secretary-General, in cooperation with the relevant United Nations and other international organizations and national, regional and international cooperative organizations, to continue to render support to Member States, as appropriate, in their efforts to create a supportive environment for the development of cooperatives, integrating cooperative values, principles and business models into educational programming, including school curricula, as appropriate, providing assistance for human resources development, technical advice and training and promoting an exchange of experience and best practices through, inter alia, 19-22039 3/4