logo

No. 3

Published December 23 2020

Full Issue

Articles

  1. Aneta Suchoń (Author)

    COOPERATIVES IN THE PROCESS OF DEVELOPING THE MULTIFUNCTIONALITYOF RURALAREASIN POLAND –SELECTED LEGAL ISSUES

    The purpose of this paper is to indicate the different kinds of cooperatives in rural areasand the factors that have influenced the progress of such entities in Poland, as well as how cooperatives affect the development of agriculture and rural areas. The paper also considers whether legal regulations facilitate or hinder the setting up and functioning of cooperatives, from the perspective of multifunctional agriculture and rural developmentinPoland.Problems concerning both cooperatives and multifunctional rural development are broad.Therefore,only selected issues are addressed. Thepaper begins withgeneral information about the multifunctionality of villages and the sustainable developmentof rural areas,followed by a short history of the development of cooperativesin Poland. Thepaper then turns to the contribution of cooperativesto the development of agricultural activity most popular in rural areas. The types of cooperatives considered includeagricultural production cooperatives, cooperative groups, organizations of agricultural producers, and farmers’ cooperatives. There is also a focuson social cooperativesand energy cooperatives and their contributions to multifunctionality of rural areas. What is observed is that legal regulations concerning the organisation and functioning of agricultural cooperatives are being extended. The political transformation, the principles of the market economy and the acquisition of EU membership haveresultedin the legislator becoming more focused on the association of agricultural producers selling agricultural produce and supporting other stages of agricultural activity.This isanimportant activity of cooperatives in the process of developing themultifunctionalityof rural areasin Poland.The discussion presented in the article has confirmed that social cooperatives have been functioning in the Polishlegal system for a relatively short time, but they are becoming increasingly popular as effective tools of social economy in rural areas. The author underlines that such entities are especially needed in villages, where the unemployment rate is very high,and the ways of supporting excluded and disabled people are limited, when compared with cities.The author concludes thatfurther changes in legislation are necessary for the continued process of developing cooperatives and the multifunctionality of rural areas.

  2. Willy Tadjudje (Author)

    STANDARDIZATION OF COOPERATIVE LAW IN AFRICA: A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS BETWEEN THE OHADA UNIFORM ACT RELATED TO COOPERATIVE SOCIETIES AND THE EAST AFRICA COMMUNITY’SCO-OPERATIVE SOCIETIES BILL

    In Africa, two organizations have developedsupranational legal frameworksapplyingto cooperative societies. The first isthe Organization for the Harmonization of Business Law in Africa, in French Organisation pour l’harmonisation en Afriquedu droit des affaires(OHADA)with the Uniform Act onCooperative Societies(UA). The second is the East African Community (EAC) with the East African Community Cooperative Societies Bill 2014 (EAC Bill). The EAC Bill has notreceived the assent ofthe Heads of State in the EAC, so it is not yet an Act of the EAC Community. However, the purpose of this article is to compare these two legal frameworks. For the purpose of this analysis and comparison, the EAC Bill will be treated as if it was an Act of the Community.

  3. Michael Fefes (Author)

    THE GREEK ANTI-PARADIGM: HOW LEGISLATION ON AGRICULTURAL CO-OPERATIVES CAUSED THEIR FAILURE

    The first piece of Greek co-operative legislation was promulgated in 1914. This legal regime remained till 1979,having been amended several times. Since 1979, there were seven laws concerning exclusively rural co-operatives. One may presume that such interest shown by Greek legislators would mean the development and expansion of co-operative model in rural sector. Nevertheless,theco-operative enterprise model has been a failure in Greece, at least as regards rural co-operatives. The present paper attemptsto point out that Greek legislation has played a negative role forruralco-operatives and had a serious contribution to their decline instead of serving as an encouraging and enforcing factor to their routing and betterment. In addition, one may stipulate that Greek legislation follows a specific pattern with the purpose to supervise and control rural co-operatives, treating themnot as enterprises but as political tools. The above comments will be based on theanalysis of three relevant laws in Greece, that is Law 1541/1985, Law 4015/2011 and Law 4384/2016, while a very brief commendation is to be done as to the very recent development on 11thMarch 2020 (Law 4673/2020).

  4. Yimer A. Gebreyesus (Author)

    SAVING AND CREDIT COOPERATIVE SOCIETIES IN ETHIOPIA: A QUEST FOR COMPREHENSIVE LAWS

    Formal cooperatives were introduced in Ethiopia by employees ofthe Ethiopian Road Authority and Ethiopian Airlines in early 1950.Since then,saving and credit cooperatives are one of the most common kinds of cooperatives in Ethiopia.However, saving and credit cooperatives cannot be considered champions in facilitating access to finance for people,mainlydue tolack of innovation, networking among themselves, limited product varieties offeredto their members,and lack of a comprehensive legal framework that supportstheir development. Well thought-outlaws that provide the required confidence for members and other stakeholdersare vital for the development of cooperativesin the country. However, in Ethiopia, there are nolaws thathave beenspecificallydeveloped to regulate saving and credit cooperatives, otherthan ageneral mention in the cooperative laws that focus on other forms of cooperatives. Ethiopiancooperative laws do not provide detailed provisions in relation to saving and credit cooperatives. This articleargues that Ethiopia should introduce a legal framework that providesclear guidelineson important issuesthat are currently left unaddressed by the CooperativeSocietiesProclamationNo. 985/2016to maximize the financial, social and economic benefits from saving and credit cooperatives. Ethiopia is one of the poorest countries in the world with alarming rate of financial exclusion. Access to finance is critically limited in the country and only a few privilegedgetaccess to credits from formal sources. The majority of the people get loans from the informal credit markets at exorbitant interest rates. Saving and credit cooperatives therefore, with appropriate legal and policy frameworks, can be part of the solution tocurb the problem of financial exclusion of the majority of the people.

Cooperatives and other fields of law

  1. Sophie Grandvuillemin (Author)

    COOPERATIVE RELATIONSHIPS AND FRENCH AND EUROPEAN COMPETITION LAW

    This article examinesthe confrontation of relations between cooperativesocietiesand their members with competition law.Competition law trivializes cooperative relationships when it comes to protecting the market. Thus, the terms of membership and exclusion, as well as the obligations imposed on cooperative members, are examined byFrench and European anti-competitive practices law, and in particular cartellaw, objectivelyin function of their effectson competition, regardless of the cooperative specificities. On the other hand, cooperative law regains its place when cooperative relationshipsare assessed on a competitive level with regard to the individual situation of members; the French restrictivepractices law («pratiques restrictives») is thus set aside, to preserve the cooperative pact.

Legislation

  1. Thierry Tilquin, Julie-Anne Delcorde, Maïka Bernaert (Author)

    A NEW PARADIGM FOR COOPERATIVE SOCIETIES UNDER THE NEW BELGIAN CODE OF COMPANIES AND ASSOCIATIONS

    The Belgian law on cooperative societies has been substantially modified following a broader reform of company law in 2019 and induces achange of paradigm: the legislator indeed took this opportunity to modify a regime of flexibility and “neutrality” in relation to the cooperative principles of the cooperative society form to limit said form to the companies wishing to follow the cooperative model and principles.

  2. Aitor Bengoetxea Alkorta, Itziar Villafáñez Pérez (Author)

    BASQUE LEGISLATION ON COOPERATIVES IN LIGHT OF THE NEW BASQUE COOPERATIVE LAW

    On 20 December 2019, Law 11/2019 wasapproved,on Basque Cooperatives, the current regulation for these organisations in their applicable territorialfield, in otherwords,the Basque Autonomous Community. The analysis of this law is highly interesting, whether taking account of the importance and referential nature of the Basque cooperativemovement, or of the new features and clarifications introduced by said Law, which may certainly be controversial. This work reviews the legislation applicable to Basque cooperatives, highlighting the new features introduced by thenew law.

Practicioners’ Corner

  2. John Emerson, Jeffrey Moxom (Author)

    LEGAL FRAMEWORK ANALYSIS AND THE ICA-EU PARTNERSHIP: AN UPDATE ON ENSURING A LEVEL PLAYING FIELD FOR PEOPLE-CENTRED ORGANISATIONS

    This paper builds on existing research conducted within the ICA-EU Partnership’s Legal Framework Analysis Research, which analyses the national cooperative legal frameworks of a variety of countries worldwide. The research aims to provide harmonised information on cooperative law and its provisions, bothat the national and supranational level, including a critical analysis of laws that impede or promote cooperatives, and thedegree to which the legislation can be considered adequate for cooperative development.2With greater knowledge and access to a country-based legal frameworkanalysis partly established through an open access online platform, ICA members can advance theiradvocacy and recommendations on the creation or improvement of legal frameworks andmonitor their evolution.3This paper outlines theexploratory findings and insightsgained through this current implementation with a view to analysing, based on the current work completed, the emergent trends in a discussion on the necessary elements of a strong cooperative law.

  3. Holger Blisse (Author)

    THE CONTRIBUTION OF COOPERATIVE BANKS AND BANKING TO SOCIAL MARKET ECONOMY FOR EUROPE –MODERATION OF CAPITAL ‘MARKET AND COMPETITION

    The reserves of credit unions, credit cooperatives and cooperative banks in Europe have grownover along period of time even over many generations of members and have contributed to build and to maintain the current network and federate structures. As stated in ICA principle 3 (Member Economic Participation), “members contribute equitably to, anddemocratically control, the capital of their cooperative. At least part of that capital is usually the common property of the cooperative. Members usually receive limited compensation, if any, on capital subscribed as a condition of membership. Members allocate surpluses for any or all of the following purposes: developing their cooperative, possiblyby setting up reserves, part of which at least would be indivisible; benefiting members in proportion to their transactions with the cooperative; and supporting other activities approved by the membership.” (ICA 1995). The individual capital of eachmember is maximally paid in up to the nominal amount of all shares held by a member and repaid when the member leaves (e. g. § 73 GermanCooperative Act).

  4. Ann Apps (Author)

    WHY AUSTRALIA’S CO-OPERATIVE NATIONAL LAW IS NOT REALLY A ‘NATIONAL’ LAW

    Recently the Queensland Parliament passed the Co-operatives National Law Act 2020 (Qld). This was a quiet but significant moment in the history of co-operative law in Australia. When this Act commences,2the Australian states and territories will, for the first time, have consistent laws for co-operatives. The advantage for co-operatives includes consistent terminology for two co-operative types (co-operatives will be either ‘distributing’ and ‘non-distributing’); a consistent reporting regime which is less onerous for ‘small’ co-operatives; mutual recognition of co-operatives registered in other states; and the ability to issue co-operative capital units (CCU’s) to members or non-members. However, the ‘Co-operative National Law’ is not a ‘national’ law in the sense that most would understand. It is not a law that has been passed by the Australian federal legislative body,the Commonwealth Parliament, rather,it is a template law that was introduced in 2012 by the State of NSW as the lead jurisdiction, as the Co-operative (Adoption of National Law) Act, 2012.