Cooperatives have become an important component of modern economics. As demonstrated by international practices, including European countries, they have contributed to their economic advancement in the current economic coordinates. Cooperatives are well established in any economic sector, demonstrating a wide variety of organizational forms and holding significant shares in the domestic market in some countries. The knowledge of international experience and the implementation of innovative and strategic solutions for the development of this sector would stimulate the evolution of cooperatives with all the benefits deriving from it. In this paper we analyze the nature of the cooperatives, highlight their peculiarities in relation to other forms of the economic activity organization, assess the size and role of cooperatives at the international level, including the European one, and point out the vision of the cooperative development strategy for the current decade.