Recognising the large part cooperative organisation has to play in achieving global food security, José Graziano da Silva, director-general of the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation has announced the opening of a liaison office for cooperatives and producer organizations. Graziano de Silva called cooperatives “a key partner in achieving food security and ending hunger and poverty in the world.”

The liaison office for cooperatives and producer organizations was launched by the FAO last week in a bid to revitalize the Organization's collaboration with such organisations worldwide. The cooperative model has received rounded praise this year; European farming union Copa Cogeca has dubbed 2012 ‘year of the cooperative’ and a variety of influential organisations have advocated cooperative organisation as a means of protecting farmers’ interests in the face of powerful corporate or governmental interests.

The office was officially opened on Monday 9th July, following the International Day of Cooperatives, celebrated on Saturday 7th July. At the opening ceremony, Mr Graziano da Silva announced, "We are confident that this liaison office will allow cooperatives and producer organizations to have a stronger voice as FAO's key partners in ending hunger and poverty. Cooperatives and producer organizations have a key role to play in bringing about a future without hunger.

"Standing alone, a smallholder has fewer opportunities. When farmers get together, they have better condition to negotiate of price and better access to assets and services such as information, communication, input and output markets, natural resources, from local to international levels."

The FAO pledged to continue to work in partnership with producer organizations and cooperatives to encourage governments to establish favourable policies, legal frameworks, economic incentives and participatory processes in which agricultural and food cooperatives as well as producer organisations can develop and become strong, equitable and efficient enterprises.

The organisation has created a new website with a focus on cooperatives and POs. The model is gaining in popularity and influence around the world; in Brazil, cooperatives were responsible for 37.2 percent of agricultural GDP and 5.4 percent of overall GDP in 2009, and earned about $3.6 billion from exports.

In Mauritius, cooperatives account for more than 60 percent of national production in the food crop sector and in Kenya the savings and credit cooperatives have assets worth $2.7 billion, which account for 31 percent of gross national savings. In France, farmers are beginning to form cooperatives to counterbalance the influence and power of milk processors; they feel this will improve their position as EU milk quotas are phased out and take influence from successful wine producers’ cooperatives.  

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