Being an active co-operative member

A co-operative relies heavily on the contribution and support of its members to be successful. For this reason, co-operatives set out guidelines on the minimum amount of member activity needed for members to keep their voting rights and membership.

These are your ‘active membership provisions’. They form part of the co-operative’s rules.

Statement of primary activity

Your co-operative must clearly outline its purpose or main activity as part of the rules of the co-operative.

This is the primary activity and all co-operatives must have at least 1 primary activity. For example, the statement of primary activity for a distributing dairy co-operative could read as follows:

‘Our purpose is to sell the milk produce on behalf of our members’.

Your primary activity should account for at least 10% of:

• turnover
• income
• expenses
• surplus funds
• your usual business.

Active membership provisions

Members need to support the primary activities. The active membership provisions should set out how to do this. Without this support, the co-operative will fail.

The provisions might be:

• to pay a regular subscription fee (for a non-distributing co-operative)
• to buy, sell or supply goods or services of a certain value in a financial year (for a distributing co-operative).