KEYNOTE SPEAKER

Gun-Britt Mårtensson

Biography

A graduate in English, French and Political Science, Ms Mårtensson has played an active role in politics and was Vice Mayor and Mayor of her local town of 60,000 inhabitants from 1985-1997. Elected in 1982 as a member of the Board of the Swedish Association of Local Authorities, Ms Mårtensson then became spokesperson for housing policies and served on the The National Board of Tourism and The Swedish Board for Housing. In 1990 she was elected to the Board of the Social Democratic Party and in 1993 to the Executive Committee of the party. She chaired several governmental committees on social issues including care of the elderly, housing supplements, labour market reform and local democracy. She was a member of the Commission scrutinising the police work after the murder of Prime Minister Olof Palme, and in 1999 she resigned her assignment as chair of the Board of the Swedish Polar Research Secretariat.

 

In 1997 Ms Mårtensson was appointed chair and president of HSB, The National Federation of Tenant’s Savings and Building Societies (HSB Riksförbund), Sweden’s largest organisation for co-operative housing with over 500,000 members. She is a current member of the Board of ICA Housing, CECODHAS, the European Organisation for Housing, and was President of the Co-operative section and the Committee for social inclusion. She was also Board member of the Nordic Housing Alliance and the Swedish Co-operative Institute.

The Swedish Co-operative Centre, where she is still the vice chair, is a favourite task. The Swedish co-operative movement collects money and sponsors co-operating out of poverty projects together with the Swedish International Development Agency. The Centre concentrates its resources (around 20 million US dollars a year) on co-operative housing, co-operative farming and credit co-ops in developing countries.

 

 

At the ICA General Assembly in Seoul (2001), Ms Mårtensson was elected Chairperson of the ICA Audit & Control Committee and stepped down from this position when she was elected to the Board in September 2003 at the General Assembly in Oslo. She is also currently chair of the ICA's Governance Working Group.

“Co-operative housing is crucial to me. I have seen first hand how people grow from the empowerment of working collectively and the understanding of what you can achieve when you join forces with others.” Gun-Britt Mårtensson, International Co-operative Alliance