The Mouvement Desjardins (Dejardins Movement in English) is the largest association of credit unions in North America. Located in Quebec, this association of credit unions is composed of local caisses populaires, which are regrouped into 11 regional federations. The regional federations are the homes of common services such as large computer systems and marketing services.

Desjardins Today

Desjardins Group, (http://www.desjardins.ca) is today an integrated co-operative financial group. With over 5 million members and clients and overall assets of more than CAD $100 billion, it is the largest financial institution in Québec and the sixth-largest in Canada. Desjardins has more than 38,000 employees and close to 7,500 elected officers. Its most recent social responsibility report shows that Desjardins gave caisses members CAD $440 million in patronage allocations and contributed over CAD $43 million in donations to their local community during 2003!

Tangible Results throughout the World

Desjardins has also been working in developing countries, since 1970. In Burkina Faso, the caisse populaire network now boasts about one hundred caisses offering quality financial services to nearly 400,000 members. Other African countries that have benefited from assistance in setting up their own savings and credit co-operatives include Cameroon, Ivory Coast, Guinea, Madagascar, Mali, Mauritania, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Senegal and Tanzania. In Latin America, El Salvador, Haiti and Mexico, Vietnam in Asia, Lithuania and Russia in Central and Eastern Europe have also established cooperative financial systems with Desjardins’ support.

Membership

Desjardins is a member of:

• CDIC
• Interac
• NYCE ATM Network
• CBA

Source: http://www.ica.coop/ica/digest/29-digest.pdf

The "Mouvement" was founded in 1900 in Lévis, Quebec by Alphonse Desjardins.

Mouvement des caisses Desjardins website

See also

• Complexe Desjardins