A Life Cycle Explanation of Cooperative Longevity

Despite popular misconceptions, cooperatives present a very successful organizational form worldwide. A recent study found that in the U.S., for example, 134 agricultural cooperatives celebrated their 100th anniversary in 2014. This observation on cooperative longevity is not matched by a corresponding research effort on what makes cooperatives so successful. Most of the extant research seems to focus on intra-cooperative problems that posit significant challenges to cooperatives. This special issue of Sustainability bridges the considerable gap between scholarly work and reality. By focusing on what makes cooperatives so successful for such a long period of time, this issue sheds light on key aspects of cooperative longevity. Bridging social capital, fundamental solutions to excessive heterogeneity-induced high ownership costs, tinkering, cooperative genius, and superior capacity to adapt to shocks and changes are among the factors identified to explain extended cooperative longevity. The insights thereby gained are useful to students of cooperatives, practitioners, and policy makers.

Section: Emerging Themes and Insights From The Special Issuementioning

confidence: 99%

Cooperative Longevity: Why Are So Many Cooperatives So Successful?

Iliopoulos¹,

Valentinov

2018

“…Cooperatives are, by nature, a sustainable and participatory business form that, despite theoretical shortcomings, have shown remarkable resilience in the face of economic and financial crises [1][2][3]. As a prominent business form in agriculture, cooperative governance and performance is of longstanding interest to economists, policymakers, and industry stakeholders.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Do Corporate Governance Recommendations Apply to U.S. Agricultural Cooperatives?

Franken

Cook

2019

A limited inquiry into cooperative governance and performance suggests that best practices from corporate governance literature may not apply uniformly to cooperatives. The rarely addressed issue of endogeneity limits confidence in recommendations for corporations and cooperatives alike and inference of recommendations for cooperatives is complicated by availability of appropriate performance measures. By accounting for the most commonly recognized sources of endogeneity and measuring overall cooperative performance, expectations of better performance by larger cooperatives with smaller boards are confirmed, while limited evidence is obtained on the expected positive effects of seating outside experts on the board.

“…The Statute and internal organizational procedures set out the main steps in decision-making and the management of responsibilities [29].…”

Section: Manager-cooperative/membersmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Fuzzy Set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (fsQCA) of the Agricultural Cooperatives from South East Region of Romania

Florea

Bercu²,

Radu

et al. 2019

The need for Romanian agriculture development by efficient usage of resources and a rural environment has led to the establishment of agricultural cooperatives. Romania needs strong cooperatives and, in order to achieve this, the involvement of not only the authorities and agricultural producers, but also of each inhabitant from the rural area, is required. In the context of food market saturation with import products, it is necessary to revive the Romanian market in order to supply natural and quality products. A total of 1425 agricultural cooperatives were registered in Romania at the end of 2018, out of which 57% did not submit the Balance Sheet. The research performed within the study proposes the usage of fsQCA analysis in order to assess some conditions considered by us essential for the sustainability of the agricultural cooperatives. These conditions are represented by the initial contribution of the members, by the existence of a central collection space, by the employment of a manager, by the knowledge of the members on the development possibilities, and by the involvement of the members within the cooperative’s activity. The study highlights the fact that the absence of the conditions presented leads to the absence of a sustainable cooperative. We consider the dissolution of the cooperatives pertinent, which has not developed an activity for more than three years from their establishment and the publication on the MADR website of the National Registry of Cooperatives, which will offer a true image on the prosperity and viability of these types of entities.