Cooperation and integration are the basics of our Islamic religion and cooperative work is based on economic and social solidarity. The cooperative work was launched in Bahrain during the 1970s with a number of consumer societies, which were considered a primary source of food-catering for the families of Bahrain, until the term "the association" was named on any consumer market. There are consumer cooperative societies whose activities vary between the consumer market, the management of fuel stations and real estate investment. There are many types of cooperative societies in Bahrain to include savings and credit societies in a number of ministries and cooperatives for farmers, poultry farmers and fishermen

The cooperative society can be described as "from the outside as any business activity, but from within it is a different world". It is defined as an independent association composed of people who unite together voluntarily to meet their economic needs and social participation, to achieve their aspirations through joint owned and operated with equal rights and duties, regardless of shares owned by each shareholder. The capital of the association consists of shares written by each member.

Cooperatives are based on the value of self-help, and self-responsibility, independence, equality, equity and solidarity. The shareholders are considered the highest authority in the association and they select the members of the board of directors to carry out the activities of the association and review its performance, evaluation and periodic accountability.

Cooperative societies have an economic and social return, therefore, it must trade successfully, as it is commercial, not charitable, rather than benefiting investors, the return is for shareholders and beneficiaries of its services. Profits are distributed according to the law to a legal reserve, return on equity, the return on the transactions of members, reward members of the board of directors, improvement of regional affairs, repair and maintenance, a reward for the association's employees, and training and cooperative development of the members.

Since its establishment, the Ministry of Social Development has been accompanying cooperatives with the registration and publicity process and continues to play the supervisory role of these associations on ordinary and extraordinary assembly meetings, as well as annual meetings for discussing financial and literary reports. The Ministry strengthened its relationship with the associations and listened to their point of view by holding the third conference to exchange experiences under the title "cooperative work: "Improvement, Development, Diversification", which was held in October 2013 and came out with several recommendations, on which the ministry has been strengthening the supervisory role, overseeing the process of annual inventory, stock cooperatives, public speaking, provision of budget estimates and analysis, discuss the results with specialists in the assembly and made assessment visits to examine the books and documents of the associations. The Ministry requested the shareholders ’statements from the societies to review the data and ensure that shareholders receive their rights.