CO-OPERATION.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Issue 277, 21 July 1882, Page 2

CO-OPERATION.

Co-operation counts its failures as well as its successes, and thoughtful men have long since recognised that the public do not enquire into the causes of failures, but simply judge by the result. Thus when numbers of artisans have joined co-operative farming schemes in order to become land- owners, and have turned amateur farmers, failure has necessarily resulted, and the public has attributed the failure to co-operation. Unless the utmost care is taken to exclude the careless and idlo from any cooperative undertaking, the chance of its success is small. Yet the history i of the rise of the average association teaches us that very few precautions are taken, and that wholesale invitations are Issued to farmors to join — good, bad, and indifferent are enlistod —as though numbers ' alone gave strength, aud the drones had as mnch right as the workers to be admitted into the hive. The object of all cooperative associations is to, increase the strength of the co-operators as a body, by doing jointly what would be difficult or impossible for them to accomplish singly ; to trade wholesale, instead of retail singly ; to strike against bad work, against excessive charges on the part of the carriers of their wares, whether by rail, by road, or by aeaj against the intervention of too many middle-men, agents, brokers, and salesmen, between producers and consumers ; against an unfair division, of the burden of insurance against fire, by which farmers may. be called upon to pay higher rates than their risks would justify, in order to enable insurance companies to. successfully compete for business in the towns where the competition is keen. — But though, in the first place, a defensive alliance is sought against the. evil practices of the parasites of producers, those who combine are also ablo to attempt and accomplish jointly undertakings for their mutual benefit which individuals could never venture on. — The importation of new kinds of seed, of expensive machinery and implements, and notions on trial ; the chartering and loading of vessels, for direct instead of indirect trade, with a cargo guaranteed within a definite period, or for trial shipments of special exports ; the introduction of special strains of highly bred stock, the price and risk of carriage of which no single individual among the cooperatprs might be prepared to risk ; a farmer*' insurance association, from which all town risks were excluded: and "in older committees iv the States the establishment of a drainage and improvement fund. These and many other similar openings will at once suggest themselves to those who have studied the* co-operative movement. Co - operation docs not propose to iuterfero where middle -men's ,and agents' work is well and cheaply done/ Where charges aud profits are

reasonable, aud good work is given in exchange, one good man or one company with clerks, doing a large business and having the support of a large circle of producers, may often be able to offer many of the advantages of co-operation to his clients ; who if they attempted to compete, might quickly discover that the services of a clear - headed business manager for the association were difficult to secure, and that if they only secured a second-class man, his mistakes and bad bargains would soon eat up all the profits. But no agent would undertake to import expensive machinery at his own risk for farmers to try aud return to him if unsuitable. No agent would care to run counter to all insurance companies, for some of which lie might be employed. A company entering into business necessarily confines itself to one branch ; but farmers by co-opera-tion may be strong enoujjh any day to try a new line, and agree to share either the profit or the loss without uudergoing the heavy expense of floating a special company. Whether the movement be called a club, an agricultural or a co-operative association, matters little :' they each and all afford practical recognition of the fact that union is strength.