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39-571: The Bega Group is an Australian diversified food and drinks company with manufacturing sites in New South Wales, Queensland, Western Australia and Victoria. Founded as an agricultural cooperative in the town of Bega, New South Wales by their dairy suppliers, it became a public company in 2011 when it listed on the Australian Securities Exchange . Close to half of shares publicly traded are still held by Bega's farmer-suppliers. It

78-495: A " corporation , partnership , association, joint-stock company , trust , fund , or organized group of persons , whether incorporated or not, and (in an official capacity) any receiver, trustee in bankruptcy, or similar official, or liquidating agent , for any of the foregoing". Less common types of companies are: When "Ltd" is placed after the company's name, it signifies a limited company, and "PLC" ( public limited company ) indicates that its shares are widely held. In

117-577: A company is a body corporate or corporation company registered under the Companies Acts or under similar legislation. Common forms include: In the United Kingdom, a partnership is not legally a company, but may sometimes be referred to (informally) as a "company". It may be referred to as a "firm" . In the United States , a company is not necessarily a corporation. For example, a company may be

156-467: A competitive yardstick or as a means of allowing farmers to build countervailing market power to oppose the IOFs. The concept of competitive yardstick implies that farmers, faced with an unsatisfactory performance by IOFs, may form a cooperative firm whose purpose is to force the IOFs, through competition, to improve their service to farmers. A practical motivation for the creation of agricultural cooperatives

195-550: A licence to use the Pyengana Dairy brand. Bega Dairy & Drinks Agricultural cooperative A broad typology of agricultural cooperatives distinguishes between agricultural service cooperatives, which provide various services to their individually-farming members, and agricultural production cooperatives in which production resources (land, machinery) are pooled and members farm jointly. Notable examples of agricultural cooperatives include Dairy Farmers Of America ,

234-508: A long-term agreement. Just under a third of the Bega Group's revenue (as of 2019) was from exports. The cheese products are exported to 40 countries and distributed across Australia where they are available in most supermarkets and general stores. Their other major business segments include bulk core dairy ingredients such as cheese, cream cheese and powdered milk (making up approximately 35% of revenue) and nutritional products produced under

273-528: A machinery pool, a manufacturing/marketing cooperative, and a credit union . The first agricultural cooperatives were created in Europe in the seventeenth century in the Military Frontier , where the wives and children of the border guards lived together in organized agricultural cooperatives next to a funfair and a public bath . The first civil agricultural cooperatives were created also in Europe in

312-529: A source of financing for both working capital and investments. Cooperatives as a form of business organization are distinct from the more common investor-owned firms (IOFs). Both are organized as corporations , but IOFs pursue profit maximization objectives, whereas cooperatives strive to maximize the benefits they generate for their members (which usually involves zero-profit operation). Agricultural cooperatives are therefore created in situations where farmers cannot obtain essential services from IOFs (because

351-523: A strong history of agricultural cooperatives, dating back to the late 19th century. The first was the small Otago Peninsula Co-operative Cheese Factory Co. Ltd, started in 1871 at Highcliff on the Otago Peninsula. With active support by the New Zealand government, and small cooperatives being suitable in isolated areas, cooperatives quickly began to dominate the industry. By 1905, dairy cooperatives were

390-454: Is India's largest self-sustaining industry and its largest rural employment provider. Successful implementation of the Anand model has made India the world's largest milk producer. Here small, marginal farmers with a couple or so heads of milch cattle queue up twice daily to pour milk from their small containers into the village union collection points. The milk after processing at the district unions

429-444: Is a legal entity representing an association of legal people, whether natural , juridical or a mixture of both, with a specific objective. Company members share a common purpose and unite to achieve specific, declared goals. Over time, companies have evolved to have the following features: "separate legal personality, limited liability, transferable shares, investor ownership, and a managerial hierarchy". The company, as an entity,

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468-736: Is currently one of the largest companies in the dairy sector in Australia, with a base milk supply in 2018 of approximately 750 million litres per annum. Over half of the Bega Group's revenue (as of 2019) comes from their spreads, dairy consumer packaged goods and other grocery products, with their flagship Bega brand holding 15.7% of the Australian retail cheese market. The Bega Group's other major consumer and foodservice packaged goods brands are Vegemite , Farmers Table, Zoosh, Picky Picky, Tatura and Dairymont. The Bega branded Australia retail and foodservice cheese products are distributed by Fonterra under

507-405: Is related to the ability of farmers to pool production and/or resources. In many situations within agriculture, it is simply too expensive for farmers to manufacture products or undertake a service. Cooperatives provide a method for farmers to join in an 'association', through which a group of farmers can acquire a better outcome, typically financial, than by going alone. This approach is aligned to

546-568: Is then marketed by the state cooperative federation nationally under the Amul brand name, India's largest food brand. With the Anand pattern three-fourths of the price paid by the mainly urban consumers goes into the hands of millions of small dairy farmers, who are the owners of the brand and the cooperative. The cooperative hires professionals for their expertise and skills and uses hi-tech research labs and modern processing plants & transport cold-chains, to ensure quality of their produce and value-add to

585-575: The Morrinsville -based Tatua Dairy Company and Westland Milk Products on the West Coast of the South Island . The other main agricultural co-operatives in New Zealand are in the meat and fertiliser industries. The meat industry , which has struggled at times, has proposed various mergers similar to the creation of Fonterra; however, these have failed to gain the necessary member support. In Canada,

624-653: The Old French term compagnie (first recorded in 1150), meaning "society, friendship, intimacy; body of soldiers", which came from the Late Latin word companio ("one who eats bread with you"), first attested in the Salic law ( c. AD 500) as a calque of the Germanic expression gahlaibo (literally, "with bread"), related to Old High German galeipo ("companion") and to Gothic gahlaiba ("messmate"). By 1303,

663-642: The Taranaki -based Kiwi Co-operative Dairies. In 2001 these two cooperatives, together with the New Zealand Dairy Board , merged to form Fonterra . This mega-merger was supported by the New Zealand Government as part of broader dairy industry deregulation, which allowed other companies to directly export dairy products. Two smaller cooperatives did not join Fonterra, preferring to remain independent –

702-572: The Viterra corporation. Former wheat pools include: Other agricultural marketing cooperatives in Canada include: The Amazon region of Ecuador is known for producing world-renowned cacao beans. In the Napo region 850 Kichwa families have come together with help from American biologist, Judy Logback, to form an agricultural marketing cooperatives, Kallari Association. This cooperative has helped increase benefits for

741-580: The Bega Bionutrients brand (such as lactoferrin and milk protein concentrate ), which make up around 9% of revenue. In 2019, the company won a legal dispute with Kraft Heinz over the packaging of its peanut butter. In 2020, Kraft Heinz appealed the case to the Full Court of the Federal Court of Australia , but was dismissed. In 2021, the two companies had reached a confidential settlement. In 2020,

780-430: The capacity of farmers to prepare for and react to economic and environmental stressors and shocks in a way that limits vulnerability and promotes their sustainability. Research suggests that membership in a producer organisation is more highly correlated with farmer output or income than other standalone investments such as training, certification, or credit. In agriculture, there are broadly three types of cooperatives:

819-488: The company raised significant funds to purchase Kirin's suite of dairy products, including Dairy Farmers and Pura Milk . In 2022, the Bega Group was formed, bringing together several brands including Bega Cheese, Vegemite, Dare Iced Coffee, Dairy Farmers, Farmers Union and Zooper Dooper. In August 2023, Bega entered an agreement to acquire the businesses and certain assets of Betta Milk and Meander Valley Dairy from TasFoods Limited for $ 11 million. The deal also included

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858-468: The concept of economies of scale and can also be related as a form of economic synergy , where "two or more agents working together to produce a result not obtainable by any of the agents independently". While it may seem reasonable to conclude that the larger the cooperative the better, this is not necessarily true. Cooperatives exist across a broad membership base, with some cooperatives having fewer than 20 members while others can have over 10,000. While

897-619: The cost of the inputs that the members purchase from the cooperative compared with direct purchases from commercial suppliers. Supply cooperatives provide inputs required for agricultural production including seeds, fertilizers, chemicals, fuel, and farm machinery. Some supply cooperatives operate machinery pools that provide mechanical field services (e.g., plowing, harvesting) to their members. Agricultural marketing cooperatives are cooperative businesses owned by farmers, to undertake transformation, packaging, distribution, and marketing of farm products (both crop and livestock.) New Zealand has

936-422: The economic benefits are a strong driver in forming cooperatives, it is not the sole consideration. In fact, it is possible for the economic benefits from a cooperative to be replicated in other organisational forms, such as an IOF. An important strength of a cooperative for the farmer is that they retain the governance of the association, thereby ensuring they have ultimate ownership and control. This ensures that

975-519: The families involved as well as to protect and defend their Kichwa culture and the Amazon rainforest. In India, there are networks of cooperatives at the local, regional, state and national levels that assist in agricultural marketing. The commodities that are mostly handled are food grains, jute, cotton, sugar, milk and nuts Dairy farming based on the Anand Pattern , with a single marketing cooperative,

1014-1067: The largest dairy company in the US, Amul , the largest food product marketing organization in India and Zen-Noah , a federation of agricultural cooperatives that handles 70% of the sales of chemical fertilizers in Japan. The default meaning of "agricultural cooperative" in English is usually an agricultural service cooperative, the numerically dominant form in the world. There are two primary types of agricultural service cooperatives: supply cooperatives and marketing cooperatives. Supply cooperatives supply their members with inputs for agricultural production, including seeds , fertilizers , fuel , and machinery services . Marketing cooperatives are established by farmers to undertake transportation, packaging, pricing, distribution, sales and promotion of farm products (both crop and livestock). Farmers also widely rely on credit cooperatives as

1053-597: The legal context, the owners of a company are normally referred to as the "members". In a company limited or unlimited by shares (formed or incorporated with a share capital), this will be the shareholders . In a company limited by guarantee , this will be the guarantors. Some offshore jurisdictions have created special forms of offshore company in a bid to attract business for their jurisdictions. Examples include segregated portfolio companies and restricted purpose companies. However, there are many sub-categories of company types that can be formed in various jurisdictions in

1092-492: The main organisational structure in the industry. In the 1920s–'30s, there were around 500 co-operative dairy companies compared to less than 70 that were privately owned. However, after World War II , with the advent of improved transportation, processing technologies and energy systems, a trend to merge dairy cooperatives occurred. By the late 1990s, there were two major cooperatives: the Waikato -based New Zealand Dairy Group and

1131-417: The milk. Production of sugar from sugarcane mostly takes place at cooperative sugar cane mills owned by local farmers. The shareholders include all farmers, small and large, supplying sugarcane to the mill. Over the last sixty years, the local sugar mills have played a crucial part in encouraging rural political participation and as a stepping stone for aspiring politicians. This is particularly true in

1170-416: The most important cooperatives of this kind were the wheat pools . These farmer-owned cooperatives bought and transported grain throughout Western Canada. They replaced the earlier privately and often foreign-owned grain buyers and came to dominate the market in the post-war period. By the 1990s, most had demutualized (privatized), and several mergers occurred. Now all the former wheat pools are part of

1209-630: The profit reimbursement (either through the dividend payout or rebate) is shared only amongst the farmer members, rather than shareholders as in an IOF. As agricultural production is often the main source of employment and income in rural and impoverished areas, agricultural cooperatives play an instrumental role in socio-economic development, food security and poverty reduction. They provide smallholder farmers with access to natural and educational resources, tools, and otherwise inaccessible marketplaces. Producer organisations can also empower smallholders to become more resilient; in other words, they build

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1248-449: The provision of these services is judged to be unprofitable by the IOFs), or when IOFs provide the services at disadvantageous terms to the farmers (i.e., the services are available, but the profit-motivated prices are too high for the farmers). The former situations are characterized in economic theory as market failure or missing services motive. The latter drive the creation of cooperatives as

1287-423: The reputation of the exchange or particular market of an exchange. Private companies do not have publicly traded shares, and often contain restrictions on transfers of shares. In some jurisdictions, private companies have maximum numbers of shareholders. A parent company is a company that owns enough voting stock in another firm to control management and operations by influencing or electing its board of directors;

1326-441: The resulting entities are often known as corporate groups . A company can be defined as an "artificial person", invisible, intangible, created by or under law, with a discrete legal capacity (or "personality"), perpetual succession , and a common seal . Except for some senior positions, companies remain unaffected by the death, insanity, or insolvency of an individual member. The English word, " company ", has its origins in

1365-683: The second half of the nineteenth century. They spread later to North America and the other continents. They have become one of the tools of agricultural development in emerging countries. Farmers also cooperated to form mutual farm insurance societies . Also related are rural credit unions . They were created in the same periods, with the initial purpose of offering farm loans. Some became universal banks such as Crédit Agricole or Rabobank . Agricultural supply cooperatives aggregate purchases, storage, and distribution of farm inputs for their members. By taking advantage of volume discounts and utilizing other economies of scale, supply cooperatives bring down

1404-480: The state of Maharashtra where a large number of politicians belonging to the Congress party or NCP had ties to sugar cooperatives from their respective local areas. Mismanagement and manipulation of the cooperative principles have made a number of these operations inefficient. These are cooperative farms, jointly owned or managed by a cooperative society. Company A company , abbreviated as co. ,

1443-533: The word company referred to trade guilds . The usage of the term company to mean "business association" was first recorded in 1553, and the abbreviation "co." dates from 1769. According to the Company Law of the People's Republic of China , companies include the limited liability company and joint-stock limited company which founded in the mainland China. In English law and in legal jurisdictions based upon it,

1482-406: The world. Companies are also sometimes distinguished for legal and regulatory purposes between public companies and private companies . Public companies are companies whose shares can be publicly traded, often (although not always) on a stock exchange which imposes listing requirements / Listing Rules as to the issued shares, the trading of shares and future issue of shares to help bolster

1521-501: Was created by the state which granted the privilege of incorporation. Companies take various forms, such as: A company can be created as a legal person so that the company itself has limited liability as members perform or fail to discharge their duties according to the publicly declared incorporation published policy. When a company closes, it may need to be liquidated to avoid further legal obligations. Companies may associate and collectively register themselves as new companies;

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