Promotion of Agricultural Cooperatives and Enabling Policy Environnements

21st September 2004, Warsaw Poland 
By Fabienne Derrien, Policy Officer on Cooperatives, IFAP

The International Federation of Agricultural Producers decided during its 36th World Farmers Congress last June to put a high priority to the strengthening of its cooperatives activities in the coming years. This request is a strong demand from all IFAP members around the world.

One of the most pressing issues faced by farmers across the globe are the increasingly competitive international markets, the high concentration in the agriculture and food sector and the decline in the number of family farms in the past decade.

Farmers are looking for new market opportunities to survive: some need to go beyond producing food for their families and to generate income from the commercial market, others are lobbying for a decent income from their farming activities.

But all players have to adapt to this current context to avoid exclusion from the agricultural sector. IFAP farmers think that having well-organised structures is one of the keys to gain power, and cooperatives have a major part to play in this framework.

Therefore, IFAP believes that a specific effort is required to help organise farmers, so that they are able to work as equal partners with other stakeholders. To be equal partners, cooperatives and farmers’ organisations should have the necessary background (knowledge, experience, information, network, etc) to deal with a political and business negotiation process.

To give cooperatives the necessary negotiating power and consequently to ensure the social and economic empowerment of the family farmers, IFAP proposes its members to strengthen the capacity of cooperatives through a specific development programme.

This programme has several objectives:

  - strengthening the bargaining power of smallholder contract farmers,

 - increasing the capacity of family producers to take advantage of increased access to export markets,

 - increasing the commercial and technical skills of cooperatives, and developing good working relations between farmers and agri-businesses.


This programme looks into the role of the organisations of these smallholders because contract farming is a daily business for tens of thousands of farmers.

In the context of this programme, IFAP is in the process of organising in Uruguay, beginning of October, a seminar for its members from Latin America. The theme is Cooperatives of family farmers and the development of market initiatives.

Its objective is to define the priorities of an international cooperation programme of capacity building for the efficient and sustainable integration of cooperatives in the market.

IFAP will also organise a workshop on farmers and supermarkets in November in Uganda to highlight solutions encountered by farmers facing the development of supermarkets. Supermarkets get stronger and stronger in all continents and family farmers need to negotiate their contracts with them. Cooperatives offer them an opportunity for a better negotiation of contract conditions with supermarkets.

The results of this workshop will contribute to the IFAP policy programme and to the elaboration of concrete projects.

But how cooperatives can be politically powerful and economically advantaged if governments don’t consult them?

Governments have to propose a farmer-friendly policy environment with a participatory approach. It should enable cooperatives to spearhead their own interests, be stronger in the market and be effectively engaged in policy formulation and implementation of rural development programmes.

IFAP considers that coops should be a driving force. Cooperatives should put forward a long-term agricultural policy to defend producers' interests, regardless of the government in power. If cooperatives are to negotiate legislation to support farmers, they should prepare sound, concrete and achievable proposals for governments’ use.

At the national level, farmers' organisations and cooperatives should benefit from presenting their government with a common vision in the name of the entire national agricultural community. The proposals could thus constitute solutions with substantial political power.

Moreover, bargaining power is based upon information. IFAP considers access to commercial information as an important instrument for farmers to monitor agricultural markets.

IFAP supports the idea that cooperatives from developing countries can join forces with their colleagues from industrialized countries, exchange experiences and build operational working relations. A North/South collaboration is encouraged in order to put in place a self help development programme.

I would like to support Mr Barberini and Mr Wilkinson proposal: a stronger collaboration between ICA, ILO and IFAP should be put in place to build a pro-cooperative environment.

Therefore, farmers seek a policy framework that gives them better possibilities to compete with multinational giants. The future of farming depends mainly on how well farmers are organised to meet consumer demands. Dialogue between farmers and society should be promoted and cooperatives are in a good position to take up this challenge.

Thank you.