Securing jobs for people who have trouble finding work, providing people with creative outlets and generating regional economic benefits. These are three key functions provided by co-operatives, a recent class at the University of Saskatchewan has found.
Master’s students who studied food-related co-ops in Canada outlined their findings at a May 1 seminar presented by the U of S Centre for the Study of Co-operatives.
Kama Soles said the Churchill Park Greenhouse Co-operative in Moose Jaw, Sask., was set up in 1974 to produce vegetables and bedding plants using disabled people as employees. The organizing group wanted to assist people who traditionally could not find work and were often forced to live isolated lives on welfare.
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Soles concluded the greenhouse was a successful example of how co-ops can empower people.
“Work is more than an activity to make money,” Soles said.
“It stimulates and creates purpose for the individual.”
The greenhouse sells $150,000 to $200,000 worth of plants each year. It hires eight people for the 20 to 30 week vegetable season and 12 others for the eight week bedding plant season.
Soles said the original board selected the co-op model because it hoped to access special funding from the province but eventually obtained a bank loan instead.
Soles said the co-op has overcome challenges during the past 30 years. It lost 25 percent of its revenue in 1995 when the local Canadian Tire store didn’t stock its bedding plants.
Federated Co-op also said Churchill Park’s production was too small to fit as a supplier for its retail stores.
Government bureaucrats weren’t impressed that the co-op wanted to pay its employees wages comparable to others in the greenhouse industry.
The workers have been organized by the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union, which has negotiated a higher pay rate than the sheltered workshop allowances that government officials had wanted.
As well, the greenhouse was forced to move from its river-side location because of flooding concerns, which limited expansion, prevented the creation of more jobs and made it difficult for customers to find it.
However, there have also been successes. Soles said the greenhouse sells at the Moose Jaw farmers’ market, bids on business tenders and supplies the local good food box and child nutrition programs.
Eighty-five percent of its annual budget comes from sales; 15 percent is a government subsidy.
Soles said few employees have left and some have taken on leadership roles within the business.
With the union and co-op’s help, the disabled employees have learned to handle personal finances and live independently. One worker learned to drive.
She said the flexibility of the co-op model allowed it to innovate and challenge conventional treatment of the disabled.
Karlah Rudolph said the economic benefits are clearer at Granny’s Poultry, a co-op that has 50 percent market share in the Manitoba poultry meat business. It earned $3.7 million last year and pays dividends to its 180 farmer members.
She said meat processing increased each member’s earnings last year by $20,000 to $30,000, compared to what they would have earned if they had just sold their birds.
Granny’s formed in 1979 as a spinoff from an old dairy co-op. Board members interviewed by Rudolph said they wanted a co-op so they could earn more profit and maintain the family farm.
Granny’s has a breeder barn, hatchery, broiler barns and a food processing plant. The plant in Blumenort, Man., kills and processes up to 15,000 turkeys and up to 60,000 chickens a day.
However, Rudolph said she sees challenges ahead. Younger family members may not be as loyal to the co-op as their parents.
Economies of scale may require the meat processing side to expand, but it is hard to find staff for the processing plant. Already, migrant workers from Latin America are needed to keep it operating.
Even though women co-own the poultry quota with their husbands, seldom are women present or vocal at meetings of the co-op.
Rudolph said a woman has never run for the board and none are found in the processing plant’s upper management.
If the World Trade Organization weakens Canada’s supply management system, the business side of the co-op may not be as strong.
As well, Rudolph said society is moving toward vegetarianism, and “industrial methods in agriculture may become less culturally permissive.”
Tsevelmaa Chuluunbaatar said communities in Canada’s North have been the winners since Arctic Co-operatives Ltd. was formed in 1972.
The co-op provides 32 northern communities with merchandise through its grocery and department stores and supplies services such as hotels, restaurants, cable TV and fuel distribution. It had 19,000 members and 800 employees last year with $30 million in member equity.
Chuluunbaatar, a U of S student from Mongolia, said the co-op’s success shows the power of working together.
“They started from zero and now have everything.”
She said women in particular have gained power. Eighty of the co-op’s 268 directors are female, which is a higher percentage than on Canadian corporate boards or among government MPs.
The Arctic co-op has unique challenges because of the isolated population it serves. Weather and transportation are issues, with supplies delivered once or twice a year.
Employees are difficult to keep because of wage competition from the government and other industries. It is difficult to attract volunteers to the board because of aboriginal traditions and the fact that members speak different languages.
Chuluunbaatar said people from the South are not as loyal to the co-op as native northerners. They tend to buy from mail order catalogues or go on a shopping binge in southern Canada.
