It was created in 1952, separating from the National League of cooperatives and mutual aid societies, with a liberal, republican and social-democratic matrix.

It became the one of the three biggest cooperative representative associations (central cooperatives) on Italian territory, together with Legacoop and Confcoop (since 2011 the two together constitute the alliance of Italian cooperatives) To date AGCI is present all over in Italy with regional, provincial and interprovincial offices and it has 8 sectoral associations (environment and urban development: agriculture and fishing; credit and finance: culture: publishing industry; production and work: job services; solidarity).

Website: www.agci.it