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Cooperative
Autonomous association of persons or organizations / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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A cooperative (also known as co-operative, co-op, or coop) is "an autonomous association of persons united voluntarily to meet their common economic, social and cultural needs and aspirations through a jointly owned and democratically-controlled enterprise".[1] Cooperatives are democratically controlled by their members, with each member having one vote in electing the board of directors.[2] They differ from collectives in that they are generally built from the bottom-up, rather than the top-down.[3] Cooperatives may include:
- Worker cooperatives: businesses owned and managed by the people who work there
- Consumer cooperatives: businesses owned and managed by the people who consume goods and/or services provided by the cooperative
- Producer cooperatives: businesses where producers pool their output for their common benefit
- Purchasing cooperatives where members pool their purchasing power
- Multi-stakeholder or hybrid cooperatives that share ownership between different stakeholder groups. For example, care cooperatives where ownership is shared between both care-givers and receivers. Stakeholders might also include non-profits or investors.
- Second- and third-tier cooperatives whose members are other cooperatives
- Platform cooperatives that use a cooperatively owned and governed website, mobile app or a protocol to facilitate the sale of goods and services.
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The Research published by the Worldwatch Institute found that in 2012 approximately one billion people in 96 countries had become members of at least one cooperative.[4] The turnover of the largest three hundred cooperatives in the world reached $2.2 trillion.[5]
Worker cooperatives are typically more productive[6] and economically resilient than many other forms of enterprise, with twice the number of co-operatives (80%) surviving their first five years compared with other business ownership models (44%) according to data from United Kingdom.[7] The largest worker owned cooperative in the world, the Mondragon Corporation (founded by Catholic priest José María Arizmendiarrieta), has been in continuous operation since 1956.[8]
Cooperatives frequently have social goals, which they aim to accomplish by investing a proportion of trading profits back into their communities. As an example of this, in 2013, retail co-operatives in the UK invested 6.9% of their pre-tax profits in the communities in which they trade, compared to 2.4% for rival supermarkets.[9]
Since 2002, cooperatives have been distinguishable on the Internet through the use of a .coop domain. In 2014, the International Co-operative Alliance (ICA) introduced the Cooperative Marque, meaning ICA cooperatives and WOCCU credit unions can also be identified through a coop ethical consumerism label.