| Přispěvatelé: |
Ngo, Thanh L., Le Thuy N., Tran, Duy M., Hoang, Ngoc M. C., Pham, Thanh D. |
| Popis: |
This paper examines the fluctuations in development of agricultural cooperatives in Croatia during their 150-year long tradition. Furthermore, it investigates their role in current rural/regional development. The first modern cooperative in Croatia was founded in 1864, only 20 years after the first European cooperative had been founded. As periods of dynamic development, we can select the Austrian period (1864-1918), the inter-war period (1918- 1941), the period of “socialist cooperation” (1957-1962), and the period of “agreement economy” (1976-1990). The Croatian cooperative system documented its greatest crisis in the period of state socialism following the Second World War (1945-1953), in which it had nothing in common with primary principles and standards of good cooperatives. During post-socialist period, Croatian agricultural development has been burdened by a series of problems, which have resulted in a continual reduction in the physical volume of production and an increasing negative trend in the balance of payments of the agricultural/food production sector. At the same time, many successful examples of the importance of agricultural cooperatives in the EU were inspiring hopes for the future role of Croatian agricultural cooperatives. However, the research showed that since achieving independence at the start of the 1990s, the state systematically limited the revitalization, development, and Europeanization of the cooperative system in Croatia. The political elite of the time perceived cooperatives as a relic of the socialist system, and agricultural cooperatives as general farmers working cooperatives from the era of forced collectivisation following the Second World War. As a consequence, despite the long tradition, contemporary Croatian cooperatives have been faced with a series of development problems. Inadequate legislation has been recognized as one of the most important obstacles. Consequently, this has resulted in a marginal contribution of cooperatives to the socioeconomic development of the nation's demographically ever more destabilized rural areas. |
