Feds wipe out co-operative development support

by BETTER FARMING STAFF

About $100,000, or 10 per cent of the Ontario Co-Operative Association’s annual budget, will disappear because of the federal government’s cancellation of the Co-operatives Development Initiative.

Mark Ventry, the association’s executive director, says he’s been told that contracts signed between the provincial associations and the Canadian Co-operative Association will be honoured and some funding will be in place until the end of this year.

However, “anything that has not already been assigned and allocated is frozen and is probably going to disappear,” Ventry says.

The federal association and the conseil canadien de la cooperation et de la mutalite have administered several facets of the initiative in partnership with the federal Rural and Co-operatives Secretariat.

According to its website, the provincial association, itself a co-operative, serves as a resource and voice for the province’s co-operatives. It coordinates technical assistance grants for co-operatives to hire outside expertise to either get started or explore new directions.

The money also supports a staff position to help new co-operative ventures.

Ventry says he learned of the decision to dissolve the initiative last week.

Services such as the Ontario association’s information lines will be staffed until funding runs out and he anticipates that print and electronic resource materials currently under development will be supported. The association may also be able to issue some technical assistance grants, Ventry says. However, making up the loss through other revenue sources will be a challenge. Generating other sources of revenue and cutting other programs to find money to support co-operative development are among “a number of options” that he and the board will consider.

"A very key component of our organization is now affected,” he says, noting co-operative development is one of the association’s four key areas.

Ventry says 87 per cent of the federal Rural and Co-operatives Secretariat staff will be displaced” over the next 16 months.

In an email on Monday, Patrick Girard, spokesperson for Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, states: “These programs (Rural and Co-operatives Secretariat (RCS) and Community Development and the Co-operatives Development Initiative) have laid the groundwork for communities to more effectively interact and take advantage of opportunities on their own.” Other departments, he continues, “are increasingly sensitive to the issues of rural Canadians, allowing AAFC to end the Community Development and the Co-operatives Development Initiative programs.

Girard adds that all government departments “operate with a rural lens and will continue to play a role in supporting rural communities.” The federal agriculture ministry will maintain some policy and research on rural issues. “The agriculture portfolio continues to invest heavily in programs and services for farmers and the agriculture industry – much of which is based in rural communities across Canada,” he writes.

In an April 13 news release, the Canadian Co-operative Association notes that the decision to cut the co-operative programming comes during the International Year of Co-operatives.

According to the Ontario Co-operative Association there are 1,300 co-operatives, credit unions and caisse populaires in the province. BF

Update
 
Luc Morin, general manager of the Le Conseil de la Coopération de l’Ontario, says it was known there would be changes to the Co-operatives Development Initiative and the organization was beginning its preparations. Nevertheless, the introduction of the change last week “comes as a shock and a little bit too soon.”
 
 CDI has helped support three staff members (for northern, eastern and southwestern Ontario) who tackle co-operative development, education and promotion. The funding, which represents 15 per cent of the organization’s overall funding, is also used as seed money to negotiate matching grants. Without the money to obtain matching grants “we might as well close shop,” Morin says.