Your Independent Journal from the Heartland
As the holidays descend, it’s a good time to think about our goals for 2025 and how we’ve managed to (choose one) (a) achieve them, (b) fail miserably, (c) forget or evade them. As writer of this column, I’ve been distracted from at least one subject I wanted to confront: 2025 is the United Nations Year of the Co-Operative. And that deserves a big salute.
This was the second time the U.N. has adopted a proclamation to promote co-operative businesses and raise awareness of co-op goals. In our nation, the commemeration is passing with little ado but I have been lucky enough to work on a series of podcasts funded by Missouri Humanities to celebrate the year and educate folks about the importance of co-ops in moving toward goals of sustainability. As the series producer told me, it was great to have something positive to work on during a year of such chaos.
As we’ve worked on this project, I’ve come to realize that most people don’t really know what co-ops do. You may shop at a co-op without realizing … ACE Hardware stores are part of a co-op that helps member stores use their united power to buy from manufacturers at fair prices. Credit Unions are usually co-ops. And, in rural America, many of us belong to utility co-ops started by neighbors to bring electricity, phone connections, water districts into our homes.
The seven principles of co-ops are recognized as voluntary and open membership (no discrimination); democratic member control (your voice is valued in group decision-making); economic participation (if there’s a surplus everyone has a voice in how to use it); autonomy and independence (while co-ops often network with each other, each acts on behalf of its membership); education, training and information (education about the co-op is a lifelong job for each member and begins with annual meetings and election of officers); co-operation among co-operatives (as a member of a rural electric co-op, it gives me a little thrill when I see a caravan of our trucks on their way to help a community in another part of my state or another state); concern for community (this is hard to explain, but if you’re ever lucky enough to meet one of my co-op’s line men, you’ll figure it out.)
In the UN’s resolution, there is an emphasis on the importance of food co-ops and sustainable development. And this is appropriate, especially at a time when Americans are beginning to see how messed up our food system is. Farms in co-ops can create good living for the owners but the workers should also be able to thrive.
In farmland, co-ops have been suppliers of seed, fertilizers, chemicals and equipment.
For dairies, for example, the idea of dairies as co-ops is as old as the dairy business itself. The dairy farm traditionally has a crew to milk the cows and pump the milk to a chilled storage vat. The co-op tank truck empties the chilled milk into a tank and trucks it to the co-op processing facility where the milk is pasteurized, bottled or made into cheese, ice cream and so forth, then delivered to consumers. The farmer is paid for the milk and might even receive a check for the profits of the co-op.
That co-operative system, still in place for many dairies, is being destroyed as dairy is industrialized. In the industrial model a corporation is in charge and dictates prices to farmers and to consumers. Too late, the farmer realizes that they’ve lost their voice in the system. Milk checks from the corporation barely cover the cost of feed, housing, equipment and other necessities. Check out your sources by googling the name of your dairy. In my state, the dairy co-op that served my neighbors was taken over by a multi-billion corporation. This is the same strategy that destroyed the independent chicken and egg business and the hog industry.
While the little red barn might be a logo for the industrial dairy, it’s been replaced by big steel factories. And the industrial model is being exported to other countries. Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations in the oceans are penning up shrimp and fin fish, destroying markets for small fishermen and driving communities away from ancestral lands. .
In a study of the 100 biggest co-ops in the U.S., the National Co-operative Bank found that 47 of the 100 largest co-ops are focused on agriculture. They generate $187.6 billion in revenue, or 59% of the $319 billion generated by all 100 of the top co-ops. Other top categories are finance (credit unions), grocery, energy and hardware. You might be lucky enough to live near a grocery co-op. If so, check it out!
To hear the co-op series, “We Are The Ones: Co-operative Power Rooted in People and Place,” google KOPN Farm and Fiddle podcasts and with a couple of clicks the series will pop right into your computer.
Margot Ford McMillen farms near Fulton, Mo., and co-hosts “Farm and Fiddle” on sustainable ag issues on KOPN 89.5 FM in Columbia, Mo. Her latest book is “The Golden Lane: How Missouri Women Gained the Vote and Changed History.”
Email: margotmcmillen@gmail.com.
