This study aims to discuss the following: (1) a brief history of industrial cooperatives in the Philippines; (2) various ways, both in graphic and concrete terms, by which industrial cooperatives have contributed to the economic progress of developing and developed countries; (3) the extent of the contribution of industrial cooperatives to the economic development of the Philippines as of the present time; and (4) the causes responsible for "substandard" role of industrial cooperatives in Philippine economic development. It will also investigate and analyze the pressing major problems besetting local industrial cooperatives, more specifically, those pertaining to education, organization, production, financing and marketing.