co-operatives

How Co-ops Can Help Spread the Benefits of Automation

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There are two stories commonly told about robots these days. One is that, in the not-too-distant future, some enormous percentage of jobs currently being done by people will be taken over by computers, and the workers will be left twiddling their thumbs. The other is that, like past periods of technological change, job markets will simply evolve, and new, better things will arise for us to do. The truth is neither – and everything in between.

How Farmers Benefit from Ag Equipment Co-ops

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A CUMA is an agricultural equipment co-op that provides farmers the use of large, expensive machinery, and decreases the cost to access up-to-date equipment. As an organization, a CUMA is group of farmers involved in the same sector (grain farming, dairy, etc.), who pool equity based on the type of equipment they need.

What Would a Co-op Coin ICO Look Like?

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Co-op coins are not a new concept but the days of trading locally minted coins for a pint of milk or a loaf of bread are long gone. Instead, the rising interest in digital currencies and rapid increase in the number of Initial Coin Offerings looks set to make 2018 “the year of the crypto currency”.

The Catalan Integral Cooperative – The Simpler Way Revolution is Well Underway!

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This is a remarkable and inspiring movement in Spain, now involving hundreds of people in what I regard as an example of The Simpler Way transition strategy … which is primarily about going underneath the conventional economy to build our own new collective economy to meet community needs, turning our backs on and deliberately undermining and eventually replacing both the capitalist system and control by the state.

Moeda: The Cooperative Cryptocurrency That Aims to Advance Financial Inclusion

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Can the boom in cryptocurrencies help achieve inclusive, cooperative growth? That’s what Moeda, a cooperative crypto-credit banking platform seeks to accomplish. The group’s well on its way. It recently concluded an initial coin offering in August of this year that raised $20 million dollars.

How does a Multistakeholder Co-op Work?

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The Ecological Land Co-operative (ELC) was set up to address the lack of affordable sites for ecological land-based livelihoods. A life on the land is a dream for many, but one in which the barriers are high, and the ELC recognised that this needed to be addressed.

How the European Social Enterprise SMart is Creating a Safety Net for Freelancers

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SMart is a social enterprise founded in 1998 in Belgium. The project’s aim is to simplify the careers of freelancers in cities across Europe where SMart operates. These days, there are many freelancer services — cooperatives, coworking spaces, unions — but at the time of its inception, SMart officials were focused on one subsection of this workforce: artists.

New Report Shines Light on Groundbreaking Catalan Cooperative

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The goal of the Catalan Integral Cooperative (“Integral” is a Spanish word best translated as “holistic”) is to build an anti-capitalist cooperative structure not just for the benefit of its own fee-paying members, but for the Commons as a whole.

We Are Connection

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Eticom is a member of mésOpcions, an “intercooperation” project that bundles together the goods and services offered by a number of cooperatives – in addition to Eticom, including Som Energia and Fiare – and which, according to its coordinator, Jordi Rojas, “seeks to provide access to social market services. For just six euros a year, you can access the services of all the projects without having to become a member of each one of them.”

The Socialist Experiment: A New-Society Vision in Jackson, Mississippi

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“The reason I started off with that little prelude,” he told the Neighborhood Funders Group Conference attendees, “is that I wanted to say that what has not changed is the vision of that new society, that new way of thinking. That new way of engineering and governing a society, where everyone would be treated with dignity. Where there would be no class, no gender, or color discrimination. Even though it didn’t happen in that little community which we called El Malik, now it’s about to happen in Jackson, Mississippi. And would you believe it?”

Tombreck – Pigs, Community Land Ownership, and Thinking about the Future

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The question of land is crucial to answer today’s ecological and social issues. Indeed, who owns it is usually a good indicator of the state of our societies, and has a deep impact on what is done on it. Once again, the physical and temporal factors are intrinsically linked. When people own the land, as is the case in community owned land that id being developed in the North West of Scotland, they feel a stronger connection to it and are therefore more keen on protecting it and securing it for future generations.