CO-OPERATION AND AGRICULTURE.

Timaru Herald, Volume LVIII, Issue 1832, 6 August 1895, Page 4

CO-OPERATION AND AGRICULTURE.

At the meeting of the British Cooperators Congress, a paper was read by Mr D. Mclnnes, on the Lincoln Cooperative Society. The countryman, Mr Mclnnes began by pointing out, is at a grqat disadvantage with the townsman m the matter of co-operation. Then he went on to give an account of the village branch stores which the Lincoln Cooperative .Society has been building up m its own neighbourhood. When a desire for information about the movement is manifested m any place and a communication is made to the society, a public meeting is held, and members are enrolled if a sufficient number will join to warrant a van delivery of goods being established. Little or no capital is forthcoming, but as trade in-

creasesand capital accumulates from dividends, a branch stove is opened and larger van rounds avo taken, until another branch is established and, from it as a centre, a fresh district is worked. The results of this co-operative propaganda that can be shown m figures are nine branches with a total membership of 27^5, who hold capital amounting to £14,333. They withdrew from the society last year £3500, and deposited with it £1000. 'Using the society thus as a bank is looked upon by the agricultural class as one of the greatest advantages arising out of co-operation, especially since the cultivation of allotments and the consequent extension of pig-keeping has converted the agricultural labourer into a small producer on his own account. Goods are exchanged by the society for vegetables, butter, and eggs, at current market rates, to the value of £6300 yearly. Stated briefly, the agricultural class m one country, simply through the action of one society, have obtained by co-operative trading (1) possession of £14,333 of capital, (2) a market at their own doors for a portion of their produce, (3) a bank which is continually receiving, m addition to deposits of small savings, dividends on purchases, (4) a source whence money can be borrowed on mortgage at easy rates of repayment, and (5) lastly, constant contact and interchange of ideas with town workers. And this work is steadily growing. What then, asked Mr Mclnnes, are the hindrances to further advance ? A conference had been held to discuss this question, and 1 c noted the answers given, which amounted to this : — As a class, we still lack confidence m each other ; we have not sufficiently free access to the land; we are slow of being convinced that technical education is needful for us, either m dairying orany other branch ; we want town co-operators to take the lead and bring us m, as has been done m co-operative shopkeeping. Independent farming societies could not be looked to with any hope. Mr Mclnnes had alao an interesting word to say of the farm conducted by his society:— lt grows produce for an assured market — namely, its town membership—but the 12 acres of land it purchased six years ago were only of poor quality. Good tillage and manuring have altered this, and meanwhile, averaging the whole period, the venture has psid well. But it has done so simply because there has been a mouth re"ady foV every mouthful grown, and for all human mouths could not take, the mouths of a herd of pigs have always been available.