The State has a strong tradition of cooperative movement. There is documentary evidence of this from the year 1900. In India, cooperative banks were first formed in 1904 in Sehora district, Jabalpur and Vadodara. Madhya Pradesh has been a leader in the formation of cooperative banks. The Co-operative Department and more than 50,000 cooperative societies affiliated to it, despite all their limitations, have provided a strong base to the economy of the state through business promotion and welfare schemes.

Agricultural credit institutions and in the State have always been ready to serve farmers. Consequently, the state got the highest position in the field of agricultural production.

There are more than four thousand five hundred primary agricultural credit cooperative institutions in the state.

They are mainly engaged in important tasks like short term agricultural loan distribution, supply of agricultural inputs, procurement of agricultural products and Public Distribution System.

Madhya Pradesh has made new achievements in the field of Women Empowerment through self-help groups and cooperatives. Lakhs of women from poor and deprived sections of rural areas are becoming self-dependent by organizing themselves in the form of self-help groups.