The Cooperative group has announced it has begun a process that will lead to the sale of its farms.

The process is being instigated as "part of the wider strategic review of all of [Co-op] businesses", a group spokesperson said on Wednesday. The Co-operative Group has decided that its Farms are "non-core" and so plans to sell off the farm businesses, as well as its pharmacy branch.

Tensions have reportedly emerged between Co-op activists, who claim that the Co-operative's founding ideals have been eroded in recent business decisions, and its 'professional' board members.

The Co-op Group's planned changes are part of a desperate attempt to revitalise the business. The group is expected to post losses of over £2 billion for 2013 at the end of March. The losses mostly stem from problems with the Cooperative Bank, which was narrowly rescued from collapse in late 2013.

In August 2013, the Co-op Group announced losses of £550 million for the first half of the year.

Sources within the group claim that activists feel management is attempting to use the crisis as a means of turning the Co-operative, the largest group in the UK run on co-operative principles, into more of a conventional enterprise.

The Co-operative farm legacy stretches back to 1896, when the group purchased its first farm to produce potatoes.  

Co-op farming operations are mostly arable businesses, but some of its 14 farms also produce fruit, vegetables and honey. Many also have a strong focus on less environmentally damaging food production, with important ecological measures in place, and some run visits to provide learning experiences for children as well as training programmes for young people.

The Group has launched a 'Have Your Say' consultation, which management hopes will inform changes designed to shape the future of the Co-operative. On Monday, a week after its launch, the consultation had received 80,000 responses.

Further details of the outcomes of the Co-operative's strategic review are unlikely to emerge until the time of its annual meeting in May.