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information for the concerned consumer
Co-operatives
The Co-op has launched Plan Bee which aims to combat the recent decline in the UK bee population. The ten-point plan includes strategies such as banning of certain pesticides linked to bee death, an information and education campaign and an investment of £150, 000 into research into the problem. The Co-operative is the UK’s largest farmer and a leader on environmental issues, and as such is deeply concerned by the plight of bees in the UK and worldwide. In the UK alone bees contribute £165m a year to the economy through pollination, but in the winter and spring of 2008 one in three UK honeybee hives were lost.
Ugandan co-operatives rise again
Farming co-operatives in Uganda are once again growing in number. Co-operatives began in the country in the 1930s but were disbanded in the 1990s on the advice of the World Bank and farmers were encouraged to sell on the free market. However the higher prices promised by this did not materialise. Farmers suffered from the loss of co-operative finance schemes and the protection and security the co-ops offered. The Ugandan government, through its ‘prosperity for all’ programme is now encouraging coffee farmers to set up co-ops and plans to give state funding to the project. Farmers who join co-ops hope to gain collective bargaining power and to cut out the middle-men who take advantage of the farmers. These middle-men buy the farmer’s unripe coffee at low prices while it is still on the trees and sell it on for higher prices once it has ripened. They also get illiterate farmers to sign rogue contracts.
Beyond a Fair Price: the Co-operative Movement and Fair Trade
Cooperatives for Development have just launched a new report entitled 'Beyond a Fair Price' which examines the history of co-operative involvement in the Fair Trade movement and makes recommendations for the future of Fair Trade.
Cooperatives for Development is a programme of the Co-operative College. It is supports and strengthens the contribution that co-operatives make to poverty reduction through research and policy work.
Download the document here
Celina Cossa is head of "Green Zones Cooperatives" in Mozambique, the main supplier for Maputo’ s vegetable markets and the most important producer of chickens in the country.
She has come a long way to achieve this. One obstacle was overcoming the dangerous fighting between The Mozambique National Resistance(RENAMO) and the government of Mozambique, which has claimed the lives of about one million people over 16 years.
Thanks to the efforts of people such as Ms Cossa, a change has been possible. Green Zones is organised by the General Union Of Cooperatives(GUC). Their members are related to GUC directly or through a local union. The GUC's key roles are to:
• Buy livestock and produce from the cooperatives to sell in the city. Private access is too expensive for most producers.
• Supply basic farm implements such as seeds, fertilizers, hoes, watering cans, hosepipes, construction materials and diesel pumps. Most cooperatives cannot afford the market price of this basic equipment.
• Provide education to empower people to take control of their own lives.
This research report from COPAC focuses on twenty case studies of successful cooperatives on the African continent. It also includes examples of two successful African cooperative colleges.
Agricultural Co-operatives - Good for Development
A report from the US Overseas Cooperative Development Council (OCDC) has emphasised the importance of agricultural co-operatives on the path to development.The report explores the ways different kinds of co-operatives contribute to economic growth and social advancement in the developing world.
The role of agricultural co-operatives is particularly important because three-quarters of the poor in developing nations live in rural areas. Lifting people out of poverty is therefore highly dependent on what happens in the agricultural sector. Co-operative initiatives such as India's National Dairy Development Board (NDDB) can help on the pathway to economic, democratic and social transformation.
