CO-OPERATION IN DENMARK

Hokitika Guardian, 8 October 1931, Page 2

CO-OPERATION IN DENMARK

TRIUMPH OF ORGANISATION. A COMPARISON. LONDON, August 21. Those who have studied trading conditions i l l Denmark—and a number of New Zealanders have recently visited that country—must he .struck with the great- difference there is between the co-operative system there and the socalled co-operation in New Zealand. Probably this marked difference can be attributed to the human characteristics of the two nations. The Danes are educated from their earliest years to take their places in the great system. Once having got into their particular niche, they do their jobs and mind their own business. There are to-day 109.030 families in Denmark on farms ranging in area from 1 1-3 acres to 24J acres. They have been put there by a beneficent Government. Some of them have only a dozen pigs, three cows, and a few hens, but they ‘manage to subsist very largely on the produce of their land. Every district is arranged under a co-operative system. Above that there is the provincial co-operative system, and higher still the national co-oper-ative system. Suitable men are ap< pointed to fill the executive posts, and once having been appointed they are left to do their jobs. No one interferes with them unless they are inefficient, when they may be removed. The man at- the head of the national marketing is a dictator s o long as he is being employed. He does not look for advice and dictation from his board except perhaps in regard for general principles. He has been chosen for the post and while lie holds it he expects freedom to act in the way he thinks best.

HEAVY FINES. No farmer is forced to enter into the co-operative system, but once he has made up his mind to do so lie signs n contract which binds him for a period of years. If he breaks his contract no can be prosecuted under the common law of the country and fined heavily. The result is that a farmer inside the system attends to lps business, delivers his milk or his pigs to the proper quarter, and then goes back to his work. He is not expected, nor does he attempt to give an opinion ns to how hi s produce should be handled and where and at what price it shall be sold.

If any trouble arises there are experts on the spot to search out the cause and to suggest a remedy. The whole system is a triumph of organisation. Tf one compared it- to a form of government the nearest approach perhaps would be feudalism with absolute monarchy at the head.

How different is the co-operative marketing of New Zealyjid ! The two systems are probably diametrically opposed, that in the* Dominion being comparable rather to a form of democracy where the smallest units are ever busy attending to matters which should not concern them.