Farming Coop incubator launches
7/10/2017
Andrew ward, co-founder of Ethical Fields said that “Cooperatives are the original social enterprise, but forming them is hard work”. With that in mind, he launched the initiative to create a new model to address the issue of many farming groups being indebted to big chemical companies and supermarket chains.
A new cooperative has been set up to help other cooperatives set up.Andrew ward, co-founder of Ethical Fields said that “Cooperatives are the original social enterprise, but forming them is hard work”. With that in mind, he launched the initiative to create a new model to address the issue of many farming groups being indebted to big chemical companies and supermarket chains.
He also mentioned the the new cooperative will have a big impact on the farmers as they can remove the middlemen which will enable them to deliver higher prices at the farmgate and keep the running costs to a reasonable amount, while giving freedom to the farmers to control their own destiny.
Cooperatives have been declining
It was observed in the past years that the cooperatives have been declining rather than growing due to the banks preferring to lend to companies or individuals rather than cooperatives.
Currently, starting a cooperative in Australia is a lot more cost and resource intensive compared to setting up a company.
According to Mr. Ward, one root cause of this decline can be associated with the difficulty in accessing the necessary legal and financial advice to set them up and run them successfully.
Mr Ward went on to explain the frustration this situation presents, especially in light of the many advantages of a well run coop and the criticism that the farm sector gets for supporting the profits of big multinationals while farmers struggle financially.
Experts available to help founders
To address the issue, Incubator.coop is to give coop founders access to a range of passionate and hardworking experts who share their values and aspirations for success and positive social impact. This includes experts in the fields of accountancy, law, farming or in academia.
Based on the study made by Southern Cross University and the national Farming Together project regarding the coop model, they are finding it to have distinct advantages.
But Mr Ward said Incubator coop was not just about accelerating growth in the coop sector.
He mentioned that there may be an opportunity to disrupt the traditional start-up incubator model.
In order to achieve these goals, the coop is looking to get start-up money through crowdfunding.
Mr. Ward’s intention is that while the Incubator.coop harness key lessons from the start-up incubators in order to bring agility and innovation to the coop sector, it will flips the incubator model on its heads. He mentioned that the existing incubators promote business models and an economy where the shareholders returns outpace other stakeholders, serving investors over incubatees, with that he emphasized that the cooperative’s structure aligns with the interests of founders, investors and advisers in a long-term venture.
An initial 60-day crowdfunding campaign was done in late August to get the minimum necessary tools online and running costs in place.
