The Great Challenge of cooperatives For the coming years it will be better to understand how the consumer works of new generations, who value more and more subjects such as sustainability, traceability, healthy and convenience. This is the opinion of José Rossato Junior, a member of the Council of the Agroindustria Cooperative (Coplana), who participated in the panel “Challenges and Opportunities for Modern Agro cooperatives during the Global Agribusiness Festival (GAFFFF)which happens on June 5 and 6, at the Allianz Parque Stadium, in São Paulo.
“Meeting this new consumer, who wants to know where what he is eating from and if he is sustainable will be the great opportunity for cooperatives,” said Rossato. All this within a challenging scenario of high interest rates and lack of specialized labor in the countryside, according to moderator Matheus Kfouri Marino, representative of the Brazilian Cooperative Organization (OCB).
To meet these new demands of modern society, another challenge will be the adoption of new technologies in the countryside, according to Coopercitrus president, Fernando Degobbi. “And it doesn’t only mean having connected machines, but also a good seed and techniques that help plant right in a well -prepared soil for greater productivity,” says the executive.
But for all this to work, credit must be more accessible to the producer and the input industry acts closer to the field so that all technology really creates a more sustainable environment, according to Degobbi.
In this sense, the cooperatives are the crucial points, uniting all the tips of the productive sector, according to Marino. No wonder there are more than 4,500 cooperatives in Brazil today, and the highest concentration is in the agricultural sector, which total 1,179 cooperatives. Together, they already gather 23 million members, about 10% of the national population, and they pass more than half of grain production across the country.
The numbers only confirm the phrase of French writer Alexandre Dumas of “One for All and All for one,” in the classic novel “The Three Musketeers”, which became the essence of this segment. “Therefore, the basis of cooperativism is ESG, because we have never been a personal but always collective thing, developing so much people, governability and producing sustainably to serve this new consumer,” said Sandro José Amadeu, Copemota Commercial Superintendent. The cooperative was founded in 1959 in the Paranapanema Valley and has since been bringing local producers closer to the final market.
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For Coperalfa Vice President CLADIS JORGE FULANETTO, legal certainty is also an important point for the advancement of cooperatives in Brazil. According to him, the management of cooperatives must deal with many tax and legal issues. Therefore the rules are essential, according to the representative of Coperalfa, one of 14 cooperatives that form Aurora Coop, which earned $ 24 billion last year alone. “These are the rules that allow us to be security to invest in the structure and be closer to both the producer and the end consumer,” he says.
Agro Festival
The panel on the challenges and opportunities for cooperatives in Modern Agro was part of the largest agro culture festival in the world, which expects to bring together 20,000 participants in the two days of the event, which ends on Friday (6). Considered a meeting place for debate on agribusiness trends, innovations and challenges, the meeting has a program for 35 panels and 100 speakers distributed in three simultaneous stages. Almost 200 companies in the sector were present.
In addition to the content of the lectures, the event featured a business, tasting and gastronomy classes and musical shows.
