미국 농협의 변화 사례와 시사점

Abstract

This paper describes changes in U.S. agricultural cooperatives. Since the 1990s, U.S. agricultural cooperatives have merged together to enhance competitiveness and enlarged the scope of their business. There also emerged various organizational structures, such as marketing agency-in-common(MAC), subsidiaries, joint venture with investor-owned-companies, holding companies, and information sharing organization. In recent years, traditional cooperative models were transformed to new models, such as new generation cooperatives and the Wyoming cooperative model. In these new models, capital is raised by not only members' equity, but also external investors. Since the bankruptcy of Farmland Industries and Agway, more people became suspicious about sustainability of agricultural cooperatives. In order for agricultural cooperatives to sustain in the 21st century, the U.S. Department of Agriculture suggests the improvement of board system and organizational structure, the development of new growth strategies, an increase of equity capital, and intensification of education.