Agricultural cooperatives help farm products get on the shelves of large stores.
Novgorod agricultural cooperatives help farm products get on the shelves of large stores. In Soviet times, the owners of household plots sold vegetables through collection points, now with the help of large farmers.
- Marina Ivanovna, your cucumbers?
- My.
- Kholinsky?
- Kholynsky, Kholynsky seeds, good cucumbers …
60 kilograms of fresh cucumbers and everything is just right. Marina Antonova, a resident of the village of Bronnitsa, delivers crops to the cooperative a couple of times a week. These places near Novgorod have been famous for their cucumbers since the time of Peter the Great, and it is not surprising that at one time the fishery was put on a grand scale.
“My mother planted cucumbers, I was still little, we had a motor ship and we took cucumbers to the city to the old market,” says Marina Antonova, a resident of the village of Bronnitsa.
Earlier, in the days of consumer cooperation, Marina Ivanovna recalls, the harvest was handed over to collection points, such points were in almost every village. In the early 90s, the usual scheme failed, in order to somehow survive selling cucumbers, I had to travel to St. Petersburg.
“We will load it in the evening, we will bring it in the morning. But even in St. Petersburg, not everyone had money, they exchanged cucumbers for cereals, for condensed milk, ”Marina Antonova continues to share her memories.
Today, consumer cooperatives have been replaced by agricultural cooperatives. The result is good for everyone. The owners of 6 acres have no problems with sales and you can earn an extra penny, now cucumbers are taken at 50-70 rubles per kilo. For serious farmers, the volume of supplies is increasing. And this is the only way, says Ivan Pireev, and you can withstand the competition.
“Cooperatives like ours today are able to accept these products, bring them to the required requirements, certify and sell them both in our outlets and in other retail chains. This is effective. Marina, Galya, Sveta. We take more than a ton of cucumbers a day, “- says the head of the peasant farm, chairman of the supervisory board of the Novgorod Farmer cooperative Ivan Pireev.
Another component of a competitive product is its quality. For pickling, for example, cucumbers are exclusively grown in open ground and of a certain size. Still, Kholyn cucumbers are a brand and it needs to be matched. It is no coincidence that pickles decorated the imperial tables, and in Soviet times, Joseph Stalin himself did not disdain to taste such an appetizer.
-How do people react? Buy?
-They buy, they are delicious, crispy, here we already have salted ones ready …
By the way, Piraeus could buy more cucumbers or potatoes from the local population, the issue is processing. To increase volumes, you need to invest, but, for example, a loan at 5%, the farmer says, try it, take it.
“The package of documents that is required today for a farmer to receive a loan at 5% is impossible for most people. We must be freer in obtaining investment loans. Re-equipment, machinery, spare parts, support is needed more than ever, support should be more substantial,” – Ivan Pireev believes.
In the meantime, the plans of the cooperative include the purchase of a new packaging line. The domestic car will be purchased with a grant. It will help not only to avoid problems with components against the backdrop of Western sanctions, but also to increase production volumes by 30%.
