Implementation of cooperative values and principles and their influence on business of agricultural cooperatives in Serbia

Abstract

In modern economy, cooperative sector encompasses a wide range of organizations – from small agricultural cooperatives that operate within the local community, to cooperative companies that have millions of members. The elements of cooperative identity adopted by the International Cooperative Alliance in 1995 aimed to consolidate the characteristics of these diverse forms of organization called cooperatives, and to identify the basis for their separation from non-cooperative forms. These elements, in addition to the definition of cooperatives, include cooperative values and principles. In the dissertation is analyzed whether cooperative values and principles affect the business of agricultural cooperatives in Serbia. The dissertation consists of two parts. In first, theoretical part, method of content analyses was used in order to reveal the standpoints of domestic and foreign authors regarding the variability of cooperative values and principles and their connections to the business success of cooperatives. In addition, based on the available archival materials, was explored on which cooperative values and principles were built upon the first cooperatives in Serbia. Using comparative and historical method was established that cooperative values and principles in our cooperatives did not differ to a significant extent from those applied in cooperatives, especially agricultural, in other countries. In the second part of the dissertation are analyzed and discussed results of a survey of 108 agricultural cooperatives in Republic of Serbia. Despite the renewed interest in the cooperative sector in our country in recent years, the versatile analysis of specific issues on agricultural cooperatives was lacking. The special contribution of this dissertation consists in providing detailed insight into the structure, territorial distribution and business performance of agricultural cooperatives in Serbia. Based on that, using multistage stratified sample, were selected cooperatives in which independently of one another, were conducted two interviews – with the director and one cooperative member based on pre-prepared questionnaires.

U savremenim uslovima privređivanja zadružni sektor obuhvata širok spektar različitih organizacija – od malih proizvođačkih poljoprivrednih zadruga koje deluju u okviru lokalnih zajednica, do zadružnih kompanija koje broje na milione članova. Elementi identiteta zadruge koje je Međunarodni zadružni savez ysvojio 1995. godine imaju za cilj da objedine karakteristike ovako raznorodnih oblika organizovanja koje se nazivaju zadrugama, odnosno da identifikuju osnove za njihovo razdvajanje od nezadružnih oblika. U ove elemente, pored definicije zadruge, se ubrajaju zadružne vrednosti i principi. U disertaciji je analizirano da li zadružne vrednosti i principi utiču na poslovanje poljoprivrednih zadruga u Srbiji. Rad se sastoji iz dve celine. U prvom, teorijskom delu su, primenom analize sadržaja, prikazani stavovi domaćih i stranih autora o promenljivosti zadružnih vrednosti i principa i njihove povezanosti sa poslovnim uspehom zadruga. Pored toga, na osnovu dostupne arhivske građe istraženo je na kojim zadružnim vrednostima i principima su počivale prve zadruge u Srbiji. Primenom komparativnog i istorijskog metoda utvrđeno je da se zadružne vrednosti i principi u našim zadrugama nisu razlikovali u značajnijoj meri od onih koji su se primenjivali u zadrugama, posebno poljoprivrednim, u drugim zemljama. U drugom delu disertacije analizirani su i diskutovani rezultati istraživanja koje je obuhvatilo 108 poljoprivrednih zadruga u Republici Srbiji. Uprkos obnovljenom interesovanju za zadružni sektor kod nas u poslednjih nekoliko godina, nedostajala je svestranija analiza pojedinih specifičnih pitanja o poljoprivrednom zadrugarstvu. Poseban doprinos ove disertacije ogleda se i u pružanju detaljnijeg uvida u strukturu, teritorijalnu distribuciju i poslovne performanse poljoprivrednih zadruga u Srbiji. Na osnovu toga, primenom višeetapnog stratifikovanog uzorka, odabrane su zadruge u kojima su nezavisno IV jedan od drugog, obavljena dva intervjua – sa direktorom i jednim zadrugarom na osnovu unapred pripremljenih upitnika.