Agricultural Cooperatives in the United States: How Does the South Stack Up?

By Steven Richards

Good Reasons to Cooperate

Southern Ag Today has recently published several articles on why producers should consider joining, starting, or becoming more involved with a cooperative in their state. An annual publication from the US Department of Agriculture’s Rural Development^[i] (USDA RD) offers solid financial reasons to do the same.  How does a return on investment (allocated equity in the case of a cooperative) of 11.3% to 45.2% sound? It appears that cooperatives offer a distinct advantage to farmers in their state.  

How Does the South Stack Up?

The readership might be interested in a little competition (or some light post-holiday reading) – how does the US Southern Region^[ii] stack up with the rest of the US?  Table 12 in the report cited above provides information on cooperatives represented in each state, which are illustrated with the heat map graphics below and ranked^[iii].

Cooperatives Doing Business in Each State

Texas (#2) pulls its weight, ranking behind Minnesota in the number of cooperatives doing business in the state.  Oklahoma (#11), Tennessee (12^th), Mississippi (16^th), and Alabama (17^Th) also make the top 20.

Number of Cooperative Members in Each State

Kentucky comes in first place!  Virginia (#8), Texas (#9), Tennessee (#11), Arkansas (#18), Mississippi (#19), and Oklahoma (#20) combine forces to propel the Southern US into just over one-third of the top 20 placements

Marketing Cooperatives Headquartered in Each State

Marketing cooperatives generate their revenue from the sale of members’ products. Texas again takes the #1 spot, but only Virginia in the Southern Region makes the top 20 at #19. These results, however, may not reflect next-generation cooperatives and cooperatives organized as LLCs (i.e., peanut cooperatives in Georgia)^[iv].