True development is about participation of all members in the cooperative, and harnessing their talents to help one another achieve their common aspirations.

NATCCO continues to push gender equality and women’s empowerment and has reinforced its position as a governance and capacity-building support unit within the cooperative movement. Anchored on the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal #5 (Gender Equality) and aligned with the Cooperative Principles, the NATCCO Network pushes women’s empowerment as a key to the growth and sustainability of cooperatives.

NATCCO has gone beyond mere advocacy toward actually institutionalizing women leadership in the everyday operations of cooperatives and make it actually a culture and mindset among co-op membership, management, and leadership.

NATCCO has a team dedicated full-time to enabling cooperatives to have that culture of Gender Equality by developing modules that guide co-op policymakers in establishing gender-sensitive policies, implementing these policies, and actually converting such policies into the operations and procedures of a co-op.

Furthermore, NATCCO advocates the participation of women in the governance of cooperatives.

Outside the organizational structure of the cooperative, the women members are encouraged to create opportunities for themselves through the setting up of women-led enterprises to empower women boost their capacity to contribute to the family.

NATCCO itself, as a federation, has one seat reserved in the Board of Directors for a Women’s representative who is elected at the NATCCO GAD Congress every two years.

At the regulatory level, NATCCO Network directly participated in the design and creation of the 2017 Framework and Tool for Assessing the Progress of Gender Equality (GE) in Primary Cooperatives. The Tool, implemented by the CDA through Memorandum Circular 2017-04, measures and rates the extent to which the cooperative lives the universal cooperative principles of equality, equity, social responsibility, and caring for others as outlined in the Statement of the Cooperative Identity of the International Cooperative Alliance. The Tool also guides the cooperative in crafting gender-responsive development plans.

The tool determines whether there is a Gender Equality program in the cooperative and measures the level of Gender Equality in the Cooperative, thus helping co-op leaders identify the areas in the cooperative's strengths and weaknesses, and craft policies that will enable the
cooperative toward Gender Equality.

Another major breakthrough is the creation and distribution of the NATCCO Gender Mainstreaming Manual for Cooperatives.  This manual now serves as the primary hands-on resource for leaders to integrate gender considerations into budgeting, governance, and daily operations.

Co-ops are trained on having a dedicated GAD Focal Persons Capacity Building Program who is provided practical tools on gender planning, compliance monitoring, and internal policy strengthening.

Core programs include Gender Sensitivity Training (GST), Training of Trainers (TOT) on Gender Sensitivity, Gender Mainstreaming Workshop, GAD in the Workplace, SOGIE Awareness, Gender-Fair Language, GBV Prevention, and GAD Planning Workshops.

NATCCO also campaigns for the implementation in cooperatives of the Safe Spaces Act (RA 11313) and Anti-Violence Against Women and Children Act (RA 9262).

The GAD Team also serves as secretariat to the NATCCO Sister Society that aims to strengthen women’s leadership pipelines and provide structured peer support systems. Together, these innovations position GADWE to transition from training-driven interventions to a fully institutionalized governance and enterprise support unit, focused on measurable transformation across the cooperative network.