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Agricultural Cooperatives in Eurasia - ECA 38/14/2/Rev.1













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    Agricultural Cooperatives in Eurasia
    Policy Studies on Rural Transition No. 2014-3
    2014
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    Across Eurasia there is an immense divide in the development of agricultural cooperatives between the countries of the European Union and those of the Commonwealth of Independent States and Georgia (CIS-G). This gap can be seen in the differences in the spread of cooperatives within agriculture, in government policy and in the enabling legislative environment. The divide is supported by a basic conceptual and experiential distinction that existed during the socialist period and which continues t o exist in modified form between the two parts of Eurasia today. This paper will analyze the divergence in the development of agricultural cooperatives in Eurasia. It begins with the question of why cooperatives are needed, of what problems they solve. It then describes the divide within Eurasia on agricultural cooperatives, starting with concepts, and illustrating differences in the spread of cooperatives across the region, government policies and enabling legislation. A conclusion summarizes p olicy recommendations to bring the useful experience of the international cooperative movement to bear on agricultural cooperatives in the countries of the Commonwealth of Independent States and Georgia.
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    Cooperatives in the CIS and Georgia: Overview of Legislation
    Policy Studies on Rural Transition No. 2014-2
    2014
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    Cooperatives in agriculture and in other sectors are usually created by grassroots users to overcome market failures, which are manifested in unwillingness of private business entrepreneurs to provide services in areas that they judge unprofitable or, alternatively, in unfair exploitation of the users by private businesses through monopolistic practices. Best-practice world experience suggests that farmers’ service cooperatives provide the most effective way of improving the access of small farm ers to market services in both situations. International Cooperative Alliance (ICA) defines a cooperative as an autonomous association of persons united voluntarily to meet their common economic, social, and cultural needs and aspirations through a jointly owned and democratically controlled enterprise (ICA, 2013). The persons who voluntarily unite to form a cooperative are usually referred to as members or member-owners. In this study, the cooperative laws in all 12 CIS countries (including Ge orgia) are reviewed and their compatibility with universal cooperative principles and actual practices in the West is examined.
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