OLDER PEOPLE AND RURAL SOCIAL ENTERPRISE

Elderly people are major beneficiaries of co-operative and social enterprise in rural areas, but also major contributors to their establishment and governance. This intuitive belief will be tested over the next few months in a research project recently launched by the Plunkett Foundation and PRIME with funding from the Countryside Agency and Age Concern. The findings are expected to result in new work-streams in this field by all four partner organisations.

Over a million people in the English countryside don't have access to a car. This wouldn't be so bad, but for the startling statistic that 70% of rural settlements have no shop, and 75% don't have even a daily bus service to their nearest town. Whilst the age profile of this group isn't known accurately, we can suppose that a major share is accounted for by older people (classified as the over-50s in the study). For this disenfranchised group, community transport schemes and community-owned shops provide a lifeline to essential services. Other forms of rural social enterprise, such as rural housing associations, craft co-operatives and even farmer co-operatives provide other distinct benefits to older people.

But older people are far from passive beneficiaries of rural social enterprise. In contrast, the volunteer management committees of rural social enterprises frequently draw on the skills, knowledge and experience of older residents. A high percentage of self-employed people in rural areas are aged over 50, often forming lifestyle businesses of their own in preference to urban employment.

The research will study these interrelated phenomena, which are believed to distinguish rural social enterprises from their urban counterparts. The Plunkett Foundation is currently identifying a representative sample of twelve rural social enterprises which are to form the basis of field research. Project researchers will use focus groups and structured interviews to assess the extent to which each of the enterprises either benefit older people, or have depended on older people for their establishment and governance.

The results of the research are expected to form the basis for a series of practical follow-up initiatives by the project partners. PRIME promotes and supports self-employment amongst the over 50s. The research will help them to see whether social enterprise represents an alternative path into enterprise for the same target group. For Plunkett, it is expected that the results of the research will be taken up by its Rural Revival campaign, which supports rural self-help enterprises as a means of tackling social and economic exclusion. For both Age Concern and the Countryside Agency the research represents a continuation of their analysis of the role of older people in rural society.

Social enterprise is frequently perceived as a relatively new sector, driven by bright young things, primarily in urban areas, prepared to 'think outside the box'. The research is expected to show that this isn't always the case. In rural areas, older people frequently find that the time has arrived for them to release their creative energies, freed from career and family pressures. Social enterprise provides a channel for these energies and a solution to the social isolation of vulnerable groups. With an ageing population, the role of older people will become increasingly important in British society. The results of the research should be of interest to public policy makers and social enterprise practitioners alike.

For more information on the research project contact Elodie Malhomme

RURAL SOCIAL ENTERPRISE JOINS THE MAINSTREAM

Plunkett's third national Rural Social Enterprise Conference, held in Cheltenham on 25th & 26th November, boldly claimed that rural social enterprise is joining the mainstream. This is certainly the case if the line up of sponsors for the event was anything to go by, with four government departments and agencies, a regional development agency and the wider co-operative movement all demonstrating their support for this emerging sector.

Presentations from plenary speakers and workshop facilitators can be viewed by clicking on the speaker's name or right clicking and choosing Save Target As... to download. This material is copyright protected and cannot be reproduced by any means without the prior permission of the author.

Cherida Fletcher [3.36MB]
Barbara Phillips [102KB]
Helen Seymour [17.1MB]
RASCALS [268KB]
Dave Hollings [53.5KB]
Paul Jones [61.5KB]
Greg Pilley [51KB]
Peter Couchman [754KB]
Tim Lang [3.53MB]
Richard Moreton [7.55MB]
Daniel Heery [20.4KB]
Judith Reynolds [2.30MB]
Andrew Hibbert 1 [634KB]
Andrew Hibbert 2 [71KB]
Charlie Cattell [98.5KB]
Peter See [650KB]
Jo White [65KB]
Frank Millsopp [29MB]
Stuart Neale [2.93MB]
David Button [1.04MB]
John Pearce [238KB]

HARVESTING RURAL REVIVAL

Oxford Swindon and Gloucester Co-operative Society has chosen the Plunkett Foundation's Rural Revival campaign as the mechanism through which its groundbreaking Local Harvest initiative will support rural communities in its trading area.

Through the Local Harvest initiative, OSG Co-op stocks a range products in its retail network from producers which are local to its trading area. The scheme was launched earlier in the year as a pilot initiative in selected stores. As an additional benefit to support local rural communities from where the products originate, the scheme has now made a donation to Plunkett's Rural Revival campaign, to support the development of rural self-help enterprises as a sustainable solution to rural regeneration. In this way consumers are able to support both local producers and the communities in which they live.

Two thirds of the stores of Oxford, Swindon and Gloucester Co-op are located in rural areas and small market towns, so there is already a close relationship between the Society and rural residents. The Local Harvest scheme and its link with Rural Revival will strengthen these bonds still further, and in a manner which is consistent with the Societies belief in co-operative and democratic values. The customers of one form of rural self-help enterprise are effectively supporting the development of new co-operatives and rural self-help enterprises in a manner which is consistent with fundamental co-operatives principles.

For further details contact Charlotte Gilman, Rural Revival Campaign Manager.

ENGLISH FOOD AND FARMING PARTNERSHIPS

The Plunkett Foundation is working with newly established English Food and Farming Partnerships on an action-research project to assess the training and development needs of new-start farmer co-operatives. The project, which will be completed by the end of March, will inform EFFP on the development of its medium-term strategy as it begins to deliver services to the English agricultural and food industry.

Plunkett Chairman David Button leads the project, supported by Development Executive Quintin Fox. Together with staff from EFFP, the pair have identified six fledgling farmer groups who will be supported by the project team throughout their critical establishment stage. Support to the fledgling groups also forms part of the Rural Revival campaign, thereby qualifying some of the enterprises for additional seed-corn grants.

Work with the groups supported to date has already revealed one interesting finding, in that most have already received advisory support from other development agencies. This has not, however, generally been sufficient to drive the group beyond its initial idea towards the establishment of a viable co-operative business. This emphasises the need for advisers to have both expertise in collaborative models and experience of the agricultural sector.

For further details contact Quintin Fox.

MAJOR CONTRACT WINS FOR RURAL PARTNERSHIPS

Rural Partnerships, Plunkett's specialist rural development consultancy subsidiary, recently secured two major rural development contracts in Kosovo and Pakistan. The project in Kosovo, financed by the European Union and implemented by German-based IAK consultants and Enterplan, will help the embryonic state to establish advisory services for agricultural and rural development. In Pakistan Rural Partnerships will work on contract to the Asian Development Bank to help the country to develop a strategy for its agribusiness sector, which accounts for one quarter of the GDP of the entire country.

The two projects represent a further development of the impressive portfolio of work which the company has implemented during its first two years. Rural Partnerships has already implemented consultancy assignments in the UK for Defra and the Countryside Agency, and these two further international projects supplement work currently being carried out in Albania and Moldova. Rural Partnerships, which shares offices with Plunkett at Long Hanborough, is a social enterprise, with 50% of its profits covenanted to the Foundation to be used to further its charitable objectives.

For further details contact Oliver Mathieson.

DEFRA RESEARCH SHOWS THAT COLLABORATION PAYS

New research conducted by the Plunkett Foundation for Defra shows that collaborative and co-operative initiatives between farmers and rural businesses are far more successful than individual applicants in their applications to the Government's England Rural Development Programme (ERDP). The research, conducted during the first six months of 2003 in three regions of England, shows that applications from collaborative groups are twice as likely to be approved in comparison to applications from individual farmers or rural businesses.

Despite this positive take on the benefits of collaboration and co-operation, the report also suggests that there is considerable untapped potential for the further use of the ERDP by co-operative and collaborative groups. In particular, the research shows that while there is a high level of awareness of the programme amongst collaborative groups, only a small percentage actually proceed to submit project applications.

The research is extremely timely, with the English regions now preparing implementation plans of the Government's Sustainable Strategy for Farming and Food. It is likely that several of the key recommendations of the report could be taken on board by both Defra and Regional Development Agencies.

For further information contact Quintin Fox.

PLUNKETT WEEKLY NEWS

Plunkett Weekly News is a new electronic news service, available to members of the Foundation since September. The service is sent by email to members each week, keeping them abreast of current developments in the field of co-operative and social enterprise, rural development and international development.

The service, which has been conceived and implemented by Plunkett's new Information Services Manager Elodie Malhomme, is a natural development of the information resource of the Foundation. Information is now more widely available and rapidly disseminated than ever before. Time-pressed rural development policy-makers and practitioners need to obtain key information rapidly and succinctly. The weekly news aims to meet this need.

This is a further demonstration of how Plunkett's information resources are evolving to meet current needs. The catalogue of the library and information centre is already available online through the Plunkett website, and the Foundation has been contracted by the Countryside Agency to provide the content of its forthcoming web-based Vital Villages Reference Navigator. Visitors are still able to visit Plunkett's unparalleled permanent collection, but these new services mean that this unique resource is more accessible than ever before.

For further details contact Elodie Malhomme.

RURAL DELIVERY REVIEW HERALDS MAJOR CHANGES

Lord Haskins long-awaited review of rural delivery structures was published on November 12th, and is expected a herald a complete overhaul of rural development policy-making and delivery in England. Although many of the conclusions had been anticipated, their significance cannot be underestimated. In particular, the report recommends devolving much of rural policy delivery to Regional Development Agencies and strengthening the role of Defra in policy development in relation to its subsidiary agencies.

Prior to the report, Plunkett Chief Executive Richard Moreton had prepared a policy publication on the subject of rural enterprise for the Rural Affairs Forum for England, on which he represents Co-operativesUK. Many of the recommendations of this report, such as the need for co-ordination of business advisory services and funding programmes at the regional level and the need for a distinct rural enterprise policy were echoed in the later Haskins report. The Business and Rural Enterprise sub-group of the Forum, chaired by Richard, is to meet with rural policy makers in December to discuss the recommendations of the report.

FARMER-CONTROLLED BUSINESSES ARE BACK IN FASHION!

2002 seems likely to be remembered as the year in which farmer-controlled businesses came back into fashion. After years, if not decades, of being portrayed as the inadequate relation of investor-owned businesses, everyone now seems united in their belief that co-operation is the path to salvation for UK farming.

Several events have conspired to bring about this turnaround. Most notably, the Curry Report on the Future of Food and Farming identified the relatively underdeveloped FCB sector in the UK, relative to continental counterparts, as one reason for the malaise of the sector. Secondly, farmers themselves appear to have emerged from the Foot and Mouth crisis with a new willingness to consider co-operative approaches to business development. And thirdly, local economic policy-makers appear to be looking beyond farmers' markets and speciality foods in their efforts to stimulate the local food economy.

While established farming organisations are hastily searching through their wardrobes and dusting off their co-operative credentials, policy-makers and farmers are realising that the Plunkett Foundation continues to be the UK’s leading source of information and expertise on this proven business model. Demand for assistance under Plunkett’s DEFRA-subsidised Group Marketing Services scheme has tripled this year, with dozens of new initiatives under development. Over one hundred local development advisers attended Plunkett’s spring seminars on farmer marketing groups in Leamington Spa and York. And, during an intensive period, Plunkett was requested to make a policy presentation to the DEFRA Board on the current state of the farmer-controlled business sector.

Amidst these developments, the Plunkett Foundation is participating actively in the Curry-inspired initiative to establish an English Collaborative Board. This initiative presents a major opportunity to establish a viable support structure for the sector which has been absent since the closure of the Agricultural Development Division of Food from Britain in 1993. For further comments on these developments, see David Button’s article in the Reflections section.

GROWING RURAL BUSINESSES THROUGH COLLABORATIVE SOLUTIONS

The Plunkett Foundation, the Co-operative Union and three regional partners, Voluntary Action Cumbria, Co-active Ltd and Economic Partnerships Ltd, have been awarded a £350,000 grant by the Department of Trade and Industry’s Small Business Service to tackle some of the problems resulting from last year’s outbreak of foot and mouth disease. The innovative project ‘Growing rural businesses through collaborative solutions’ will run for two years to develop growth of rural businesses by use of collaborative approaches.

The project has two main objectives: firstly, getting businesses to work together to meet their needs ­ whether this be joint marketing, joint branding, joint purchasing or joint service provision; and secondly, forging alliances to buy out and continue successful local businesses when the owners wish to step down, thereby safeguarding services and jobs.

The project covers three regions, Cumbria, Devon and Northumberland, where business life has been blighted by foot and mouth disease. It targets small businesses in all sectors (other than agriculture and transport) which have suffered from both the effects of the outbreak and the long-term decline of the rural economy. Experienced agencies in each region are brought together into a major new partnership with a national support centre. The structure will enable knowledge, information, tools and materials compiled by the Plunkett Foundation to be implemented and further developed, according to local needs, in the regions themselves.

For further information contact Richard Moreton.

MILK GROUP FARMER-DIRECTOR

DEVELOPMENT

Plunkett has joined forces with the Royal Association of British Dairy Farmers (RABDF) to secure funding from DEFRA’s Agriculture Development Scheme for a major milk group farmer-director training programme. The project ‘Strengthening the Competitiveness of English Milk Groups’ aims to improve corporate governance through farmer-director development and runs from April 2002 until the end of 2003.

The core activity is the development of a training programme which will improve the skills, knowledge and attitudes of farmer-directors. The modular courses will enable directors to raise the level of performance and effectiveness of their boards and the complex multi-million pound enterprises which they oversee. The project combines Plunkett’s experience in farmer-director training with RABDF’s knowledge and understanding of dairy farming and has received widespread support from the milk groups sector.

For further information contact Quintin Fox.

MORE EXAMPLES OF SUCCESSFUL FARMER-CONTROLLED BUSINESSES

The Plunkett Foundation is assisting SAOS (Scottish Agricultural Organisation Society) to prepare the third of its acclaimed publications of case examples of successful farmer co-operation. Whilst the first two of the series focused on Scottish examples, this edition will feature 12 international examples from countries as diverse as New Zealand, Finland, the United States and . . . England.

Aiming to broaden the vision of readers regarding possible applications of the co-operative model in agriculture, Plunkett is drawing on its unique library and information centre and on its extensive contacts worldwide. Case examples showing successful and innovative aspects of farmer-controlled businesses in various sub-sectors and parts of the supply chain have been selected, and Kate Targett, the Plunkett Information Officer, is now gathering detailed materials.

The guide will be published by SAOS in the final quarter of the year.

For further details contact SAOS on 0131 472 4103 or www.saos.co.uk

WEST OXFORDSHIRE LEADSTHE WAY IN RURAL DEVELOPMENT

The West Oxfordshire Network (WON), of which Plunkett is a member, became one of 24 English local action groups (LAGs) to secure funding from the third cycle of the EU-financed Leader rural development programme. This is the first time that the Leader programme has been made available to the whole of England, and award of the grant (almost £1.5 million over six years) is a major coup for Plunkett’s home District.

The LAG development plan places great stress on the development of rural social enterprise to tackle current problems. Although a generally affluent area, West Oxfordshire suffers from some of the poorest indicators of service access in the country due to the decline of rural facilities. The Plunkett Foundation hopes to pilot some of the recommendations of its earlier project on social enterprise in rural Oxfordshire under the framework of the programme. These include the development and piloting of a ‘rural social enterprise toolkit’, research and analysis of ‘village-hub’ approaches, and the establishment of partnering and twinning links with LAGs in EU and EU accession countries.

The concept behind the ‘toolkit’ is to enable initiative groups and development workers to identify the objectives of groups before suggesting ‘off-the-peg’ models, rather than selecting a model before fully assessing the objectives. With Business Link and the Countryside Agency as co-funders of the project, a virtual Rural Social Enterprise Network will be developed to offer mentoring and peer support.

For more details contact Quintin Fox.

PUBLIC SERVICE EXTERNALISATION

IN UKRAINE

Plunkett’s successful publication ‘Ownership Options for Local Authority Services’ has found a new and unexpected application in the Ukraine. The concepts underlying the guide are being adapted to assist local authorities in the Donetsk region to reduce costs and improve service levels by developing and implementing externalisation strategies.

Plunkett are providing a range of inputs into the project, managed by the Northern Ireland international development agency, NI-CO, which include managing a UK study tour for Ukrainian local government officers and co-ordinating a regional forum on the subject of public service externalisation in Ukraine.

Although Plunkett’s externalisation guide was written some ten years ago, it continues to be used by local authorities in the UK as an effective tool to categorise and assess externalisation options. Consideration is being given to the preparation of an updated version of the UK guide to incorporate recent legislative changes.

For further information contact Richard Moreton.

RURAL AFFAIRS FORUM FOR ENGLAND

Plunkett Chief Executive Richard Moreton has been nominated to represent the Co-operative Union on the new Rural Affairs Forum for England, set up in January by Rural Affairs Minister Alun Michael as a communication mechanism between the government and rural stakeholders. The Forum comprises representatives of c30 national and regional organisations involved in rural development, and meets on a quarterly basis.

Co-operative Union member organisations have a range of rural interests: many retail co-ops are market leaders in rural areas, whilst the

Co-operative Group is the UK’s largest single farmer. Co-operative support organisations, under the umbrella of the Union following the merger with ICOM, are also increasingly involved in rural issues with the emergence of the rural social enterprise sector. Plunkett is delighted to have the opportunity to represent co-operative interests on this new body.

Further details are available from Richard Moreton.

FARMER CO-OPERATION ­ SIMPLY SUCCESSFUL

Having spent almost thirty years of my life working on the practical development of farmer-controlled businesses, I am delighted by the resurgence of interest in this business model in the UK this year (see cover page). However, somewhat ironically, I fear that over-enthusiasm, resulting in ill-conceived and fragmented farmer collaboration, could end up causing as much damage to the sector as the ambivalence and scepticism with which it has been treated by policy-makers and sections of the farming community in recent years.

The farmer co-operative business model is indeed relatively straightforward and, if it doesn’t stray from a few tried and tested principles, highly effective. It is a fact of life that small business units are highly vulnerable to the market power of larger competitors, customers or suppliers. Unfortunately, farmer businesses are, by their very nature, small units, whilst food produce buyers and farm input suppliers are often large multi-national players. Given these circumstances, it is only a small step to suggest that professional, committed and disciplined farmer co-operation is an effective way to improve the competitive position of individual farms. However, my experience shows that to realise this goal, farmer co-operatives must stick to a few simple guidelines.

Firstly, and somewhat painfully, farmer users of co-operatives must provide the core financing of their own businesses, preferably pro-rata to their use of services. Whilst tempting, in the short-term, to consider a legal structure allowing easier access to external risk capital or other equity funding, this can have the effect of skewing the objectives of the business away from its raison d’être of member benefit. The difficulties in satisfying both investors of capital and user members in one organisation are well known. Where new large capital investment is combined with development into new areas of activity, joint initiatives, alliances and other collaborative arrangements with other sectors of the food chain might be more appropriate and well worth consideration.

Secondly, but perhaps most importantly, member commitment and discipline are vital to success. Co-operatives are more than the sum of their individual parts, and only by working together effectively can they establish sound commercial organisations and improve market penetration. This means that enforceable member agreements (supply or purchasing contracts) are essential, and they must set out, both to members and the co-operative itself, their obligations to each other. The co-operative must operate as efficiently as any other commercial organisation with whom they trade, and this cannot be achieved if members fail to deliver produce or purchase goods or services in accordance with commitments given and upon which their co-operative has acted.

Thirdly, co-operatives need to have a clear vision of their core objectives. Co-operatives exist to provide benefits (long-term) to their farmer members, as investor-led businesses exist to provide financial return to their investors. Successful co-operatives, as well as ensuring total professionalism within all aspects of their business, relentlessly pursue member benefit and communicate the achievement of these benefits to members. Some co-operatives find themselves in difficulty when their managers or boards lose sight of these core objectives. Speculative ventures into non-core businesses or downstream in the supply chain have seriously weakened many FCBs. Whilst essential that directors and management of FCBs continually examine the overall strategies being followed, new initiatives must be rigorously tested against the criteria of member benefit before commencement.

When co-operatives get it right they are spectacularly effective businesses. Given a sound business proposition, adequately funded, professionally managed and with committed members, co-operatives provide considerable member benefit and are immensely sustainable. Over decades, they can dominate their industries, the dairy sector being a prime example in many countries. Unfortunately, when they abandon one or more of the simple principles above, years of achievement go to waste, and in the search for scapegoats people start to question the very model and principles which they have cast aside.

This brings me back to my opening fear. The Curry Report has renewed interest in farmer co-operatives, but has also raised expectations which may be difficult to deliver. Public investment in farmer co-operative development does pay off, but in the medium- to long-term. It is vital that the strongest advocates of public support for farmer collaboration present realistic expectations of the potential achievements. Farmer co-operation won’t save the UK agricultural sector like a wonder drug, but it does have the capacity to enable tangible improvements to farmers’ livelihoods in the longer-term. More importantly, it can start being reassessed as a viable business model, neither better nor worse than investor-owned business, but having tangibly different objectives.

David Button

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David Button, Chairman of the Plunkett Foundation since 2000, is a consultant on farmer-controlled businesses and was formerly head of the Agricultural Development Division of Food from Britain.