Governing a union of 40 farmer cooperatives

COCOCA is a union of 40 farmer cooperatives active in the coffee value chain of Burundi. Coffee is the most important source of revenues for the country and with the international coffee price reaching record lows earlier this year, governing a marketing union did not prove to be easy.

Agriterra organised and conducted a Cooperative governance training in September 2019 in Bujumbura, for the representatives of COCOCA as a union and two member cooperatives. This training is designed to strengthen a cooperative’s or an organisation's governance performance. Participants gain more knowledge and insights on good governance within their own cooperative.

During the training on Cooperative governance in Burundi

Jasper Spikker facilitated the training, in collaboration with Espérance Niyonsaba and Agripool expert* Luc Digonnet from France. Luc Digonnet is a former chairman of a goat cheese cooperative called Capri-Nièvre in France. As one of the founders of this cooperative, the Agripool expert was able to share relevant experiences with the representatives of the coffee cooperatives in the training of which the majority was also involved in the creation of their farmer organisations.

One of the difficulties the union is coping with is the difference in performance between member cooperatives. Coffee business needs to be pre-financed, to ensure that farmers actually supply their cherries to the cooperative. COCOCA arranges these working capital loans for its members, collects the parchment coffee for further processing and international marketing. However, the extremely low international coffee prices do not always allow the member cooperatives to cover the costs of the procurement of cherries and hence to reimburse the loan. This impacts the profitability of the union and losses have to be covered by well-performing cooperatives.

After the Cooperative governance training in Burundi; Member of the union with the facilitator, Jasper Spikker

In this training we managed to touch upon this complicated situation: cooperatives need their union to access finance and efficiently access international markets, but the last few years they have also experienced the downside of the collaboration. How can you address this situation as governing bodies of farmer organisations? Building upon the experience of the Agripool expert Luc Digonnet and by showing some movies of successful Dutch cooperatives, the union got inspired to start thinking about governing models whereby the stronger cooperatives are rewarded for their performance while stimulating the weaker ones to adopt best practices. The difference between equality and proportionality as a core principle for collaboration, as seen in the Flora Holland case, appeared very useful in the Burundian setting.

Members of the COCOCA union with the facilitator, Agripool expert and business advisor

Quality of produce needs to be key, to fetch higher prices, and the participating organisations were exploring new governance models which stimulate the cooperatives to adopt the best practices. In Burundi, there are two categories of coffee cherries: good quality and poor-quality cherries and all of them need to be collected for differing prices. What was interesting in the training was to see how board members and management team members openly discussed problems they see in working together and to reach their targets. After looking at this situation from different points of view, the farmer organisations decided to bring the discussion to their respective organisations after the training. Various actions were identified in the plan of approach that each organisation decided to draft, which will be evaluated after six months. To be continued.

*Agriterra’s Agripool network

The Agripool network is one of our key assets and a unique feature of our training programmes. The relationship between Agriterra and its clients builds on exchanges of experiences between peers and practical advice from cooperatives to cooperatives. Our training sessions envision to strengthen knowledge and skills, but true impact is achieved through a change of attitude. We believe that peer-to-peer relationships and exchange of experiences inspire and stimulate cooperatives and organisations to adopt best practices and thus bring change. Agripool experts who are members, directors and staff from different cooperatives are invited to participate in our training or workshops to stimulate mutual exchange among participants. The Agripool expert is an experienced specialist who ensures the training programme remains hands-on, practical and generates change.