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What’s a Cooperative?
“Cooperation” implies to act
or to work together among people for whatever lawful activities. This
is an ordinary meaning of cooperation.
“Cooperative”,
according to the Cooperative Societies Act, B.E. 2542, means a group
of persons who jointly conduct affairs for socio-economic interests on
the basis of self-help and mutual assistance, and are registered under
the Act.
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So, we organize
cooperatives for solving common pressing problems we, each, cannot
solve separately. Or they are organized to serve the interests of
their members in earning their living much more advantageous than they
act individually.
Legal Status of Cooperatives
 A cooperative can be in existence
only by being registered by the Registrar, or Deputy- Registrar of
Cooperatives who is authorized by the Registrar is accordance with the
Cooperative Societies Act.
After being registered, a
cooperative becomes a “juristic person”.
Being non-government
organizations, cooperatives are legal persons in the private sector.
Why Organize a Cooperative?
A cooperative is an association
of persons facing the same or common problems, who accordingly and
automatically better know the problems than others. Therefore, the
best problem solution is to unite those who have the common problems
themselves to come together in unison to solve them.
Being recognized by legislation,
a cooperative is legal entity and an independent organization.
Government gives support only when necessary.
The Cooperatives adopt fair
methods of sharing , among their members, the economic results arising
from their operations. This is unique of the cooperatives that the
members are co-owners.
Cooperative Values
Cooperatives are based on the
values of self-help, self-responsibility,democracy, equity and
solidarity. In the tradition of their founders, cooperative members
believe in the ethical values of honesty, openness, social
responsibility and caring for others.
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Benefits from
Cooperatives |
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1.
Cooperative grouping improves a bargaining power of the groups
both in the purchasing and marketing of goods and services
produced or needed by members of the groups. |
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2. It
generates solidarity and brotherhood in a community, which brings
about prosperity and progress to the nation. Cooperatives
encourage their members to live peacefully. They promote the less
privileged persons without destroying the rich. Cooperation
implies peace or peace-oriented. |
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3. Credit
cooperatives can provide their members with loan funds to invest
in their enterprises or to spend on necessities. |
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4.
Agricultural cooperatives enhance the members to learn
agricultural technique,
e.g. to improve productivity with modern agricultural practices,
to sell their produce at better prices. |
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5.
Cooperatives encourage equality among members in voting and
expressing their opinion in the general meetings of the
cooperatives. |
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6.
Cooperatives provide their members with education and training to
gain more knowledge and experiences, and with production loans
together with the control of loan spending, joint buying of
supplies and joint selling of produce. Cooperatives enable
improvement of better living condition in the community. |
Cooperative Principles
The main objective in
organizing a cooperative is to unite a concerted effort of the people
to solve the problems in life they cannot solve individually. A
cooperative upholds the principle of voluntariness of the persons who
join the cooperative. They enjoy equal rights in the operations of the
cooperative, and share all the benefits derived from them.
As a cooperative is a business organization with specific
characteristics, it has to strictly follow, in its operations , the
following seven principles accepted universally as the Cooperative
Principles, i.e.
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1. Voluntary
and open membership, |
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2. democratic
member control, |
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3. member
economic participation, |
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4. autonomy
and independence, |
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5. education,
training and information, |
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6. cooperation
among national and international cooperatives, |
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7. concern for
community |
Operations of Cooperatives
Cooperatives carry
on business under the laws of the country,
including the Cooperatives Act and their by-laws, which prescribe
their power of operations as follows: |
 to
carry on a business, production, commerce, services and industry
for members’ benefits; |
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to
receive saving or fixed deposits from their members or other
cooperatives in accordance with the regulations of the
cooperatives; |
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to
acquire or dispose of ownership or real rights in property in
accordance with the Civil and Commercial Code; |
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to
grant loans or credit, to lead, to let,
to
let on hire-purchase, to take mortgage or pledge of property to
the members; |
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to
grant loans to other cooperatives in accordance with the
regulations of the cooperatives; |
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to
provide welfare or relief to the members and their families; • to
give technical assistance to the members; |
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to
apply for or accept technical assistance from the government,
foreign agencies or other persons; |
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to
carry on all other affairs in connection with, or relating to the
fulfillment of the objectives of the cooperatives. |
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Structure of Cooperatives
A cooperative is
based on democracy . All cooperative members are its owners; but
not all of them can administer a cooperative. Therefore, they have
to elect, among themselves, a board of directors to carry on the
administration on their behalf. According to the Cooperatives Act,
B.E. 2542, a board of directors comprises not more than 15
directors,
being authorized to execute all the affairs and representing the
cooperative for the affairs related to the third parties.
In order for a cooperative to carry on its affairs extensively and
serve all or most of all its members, the board of directors
employs a manager to carry out businesses of the cooperative. The
manager, in turn, employs and supervises the cooperative employees
to perform the day-to-day operations of the cooperative on the
basis of an appropriate volume of businesses and economy. |
Types of Cooperatives
(6 types) |
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Agricultural Cooperatives |
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Fisheries Cooperatives |
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Land-Settlement Cooperatives |
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Consumer Cooperatives |
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Saving & Credit Cooperatives |
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Service Cooperatives |
Privileges of Cooperatives
A
cooperative is exempted from the payment of fees for the
acquisition,disposal, defence or retention of ownership of an
immovable property.
A
cooperative is not bound to pay income tax for juristic persons.
Certain
kinds of documents done by a cooperative are exempted from stamp
duties.
Factors Needed for Cooperative Work
Factors for the
success of cooperatives are as follows: |
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1.
Knowledge and
Understanding of the Members on Cooperative Principles
As a cooperative is an association of persons, these persons must
understand the purpose of association, realize their rights and
duties including cooperative principles and practices; so that its
operations can be carried on smoothly, soundly and actively in
giving its members the benefits according to its purposes. The
cooperative organizers, therefore, need education on these
aforesaid matters. |
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2.
Operating Capital
Operating capital can be derived from shares, deposits, loans,
donations and accumulated surpluses. The cooperative organizers
should assess how much capital and from where should be needed. If
not sufficient, additions should be raised by which ways? |
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3.
Sufficient Volume of Business
A cooperative has to bear operating
cost. Some are fixed cost which are not variable with the volume
of business, e.g. salaries,
depreciations, etc. Therefore, the cooperative has to gain much
enough volume of business, so as to have income covering its cost.
The organizers have to consider what kinds of business and how
much of its volume they are going to undertake, and launch a
campaign to encourage the members to do business with the
cooperative as much as possible. |
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4.
Manager of Cooperative A
cooperative has to run a business, so it employs a manager to be
responsible for operating and controlling closely the affairs of
the cooperative. He must work fulltime and have experiences in the
business concerned. He must also be honest, diligent and
knowledgeable well on the cooperative principles and practices.
The organizers, Therefore, have to deliberately select a suitable
person to be a manager of the cooperative. |
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5.
Needs of Persons to Unite in a Cooperative
If persons want to form a
cooperative for solving the common problems that they cannot
individually solve them, the cooperative will be successful it is
really organized from the common needs of its members. |
Rights of Members of a
Cooperative
A right of cooperative
members is the power they can act within the limit of the laws
including the cooperative law, rules, regulations and the by-laws of
the cooperative.
They are for example:
1. Members can attend a general meeting of the cooperative in order to
express their opinions and desires or wants. They can also ask
questions, propose ideas and recommendations, and vote under the
principle of “one man ,
one
vote”. However, a proxy vote is not allowed.
2. Members enjoy the
right to elect a board of directors and the right to be elected as
such in the general meeting.
3. Members can always
inquire a director, a manager and employees of the cooperative over
its performance, and can inspect documents and minutes of meetings of
the cooperatives.
It can see the importance of cooperative members for the success and
failure of the cooperative, since they are both its co-owners and
customers. Therefore they have to democratically control the
cooperative and be interested in fully applying their rights of
participating and supporting actively in the affairs and businesses of
the cooperative with a sense of solidarity; so that the cooperative
will be successful, otherwise it will finally fail.
Duties of Members
Duties are obligations
which the members are obliged to perform, or they may be liable for a
penalty or civil liability. Non-performing duties sometimes causes
losses of personal and common interests of the members themselves, and
weakens the strength of the cooperative concerned. The followings are
examples of the duties of members:
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1. to abide by the by-laws,
regulations and resolutions of general meetings of the
cooperative; |
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2. to attend cooperative meetings,
especially the annual general meeting, for it enables members to
know the performance of the cooperative; |
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3. to have a spirit of solidarity,
honesty and dedication for common interests; |
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4. to give financial support by
holding more shares capital or more deposits in the cooperative; |
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5. to be interested in the affairs
and to propose ideas in the general meetings including to vote for
the suitable and good members to become board members of the
cooperative; |
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6. to be a well behaved person with
broad mindedness and contribution to the progress of the
cooperative; |
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7. to support the cooperative with
loyalty and to encourage good persons to become members of the
cooperative. |
The prosperity and
progress of the cooperative in rendering services to the members, it
can be seen, depends significantly on the roles played by the members.
Therefore, they should exert their rights and perform their duties
properly and actively.
How to Organize a Cooperative?
Persons wishing to
organize a cooperative should accomplish following procedures:
Preparation Stage
Ask persons who have common needs
or interests to group together. They all must be natural persons and
of full age;
The group of persons holds a meeting to elect not less than ten
persons to act as a cooperative organizing committee;
The organizing committee holds a meeting for purposes of;
 selecting the
type, and fixing the objectives, of the would-be cooperative;
making the
business-operating plan or activities of the would-be cooperative;
making a name list
of the prospective members together with number of shares which each
of them wishes to hold when the cooperative is registered;
drafting the
by-laws of the would-be cooperative
The organizing committee shall call the meeting of the prospective
members to deliberate the draft by-laws and adopt them as the by-laws
of the cooperative.
Filing of Application for Registration
The
organizing committee members sign the application for registration of
the cooperative and file it with the provincial cooperative officer or
the district cooperative officer, as the case may be, to be submitted
further to the Registrar of Cooperatives. The application for
registration must be accompanied with other documents:
Documents essential for the registration for a cooperative comprise:
the application
for registration of the cooperative;
two copies each of
the minute of the meeting for the selection of organizing committee
members, and the minute of the meeting for the adoption of by-laws of
the cooperative;
two sets of the
work plan relating to the business or activities of the proposed
cooperative;
two name lists of
the prospective members together with their signatures and the number
of shares they wish to hold;
four copies of the
proposed by-laws.
Registration Being
Granted
The Registrar of Cooperatives
shall register a cooperative within 30 days from the date of receiving
the application for registration, with no payment of any fee.
Registration of Cooperatives
Registration of a cooperative
is speedy if:
all documents are correct and complete;
all documents, where necessarily, are correctly signed;
copies of every document are certified by the chairman or the
secretary of the organizing committee;
the proposed by-laws of the cooperative are consistent with the model
by-laws recommended by the provincial cooperative officer; they can be
amended in the future.
Ask for
Guidance in Organizing a Cooperative:
Provincial Cooperative Office;
Cooperative Promotion Department 12 Krung Kasem Road, Theves, Bangkok
10200, Thailand
Tel. 66-2281-1900, 66-2281-3095, 66-2281-8150 ,66-2282-2922,
66-2282-4860, 66-2282-6595
State and Cooperative Relationship
The
Director-General of the Cooperative Promotion Department is an
ex-officio Registrar of Cooperatives;
Deputy Registrars of Cooperatives are those appointed by the Registrar
from officers,
The Cooperative Promotion Department and the Cooperative Auditing
Department of the Agriculture and Cooperatives Ministry are Government
agencies to promote, to support, to guide and to assist the
cooperative of all types.
How to Manage a
Cooperative?
After being registered by the
Registrar of Cooperatives, a cooperative becomes a juristic person
having a power of operations as prescribed in the cooperative law and
its by-laws. It has a board of directors to administer its affairs and
to be its representative in dealing with the third persons. The
administration of a cooperative may be divided into two periods: the
initial period and the permanent period.
Initial Period
The organizing committee has the
same powers and duties, and rights as the board of directors until the
latter is elected in the first general meeting.
Persons whose names appear in the
name list of the prospective members will become members of the
cooperative from the date of its registration.
Within 90 days from the date of
registration, the organizing committee has to call the first general
meeting of members in order to elect a board of directors as
prescribed in the by-laws of the cooperative. Consequently, the
organizing committee must hand over all the works to the board of
directors.
Permanent Period
After receiving the works
from the organizing committee, the board of directors and the
cooperative set to carry on its affairs and business until it is
dissolved, if necessary.
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