You are here » Home » Telling Our Story
Success StoryA cooperative strengthens small farmers' market presence
Farmers Join Forces to Compete
Photo: AMP Petro Fedyna, the director of the cooperative, presents dried fruit samples.
Agrodvir has developed relationships with several processing plants, including Vattyus, which it easily supplied tons of potatoes, carrots, bulb onions, white cabbage and Brussels sprouts.
Small-scale farms in Zhovkva, a town in Ukraine's Lviv Oblast region, faced a marketing challenge when
produce processors and wholesalers began to seek raw material from larger agricultural entities, rather than
individual producers. The large farms are more able to meet contract terms, and dealing with fewer producers
simplified buyers' accounting operations.
In effort to adjust to a new market trend, six Zhovkva farmers decided to register an agricultural service
cooperative called Agrodvir. They first had the idea six years earlier, after participating in USAID-supported
study tours to Poland and Hungary, and in 2004, with assistance from another USAID-supported agricultural
program, the farmers could prepare all the necessary legal documents. USAID advised them on the importance of
hiring qualified employees and assigning clear responsibilities. They were also assisted in setting up
cooperative accounting and tax payment systems.
Agrodvir was registered on February 6, 2004. By mid-2005, there were nine Agrodvir members farming a total of 255 hectares of land, including 12 hectares of orchards.
The cooperative's clear, innovative vision for developing business won it a grant from USAID to
purchase fruit and vegetable drying equipment. This equipment has allowed the cooperative to process
fruits and vegetables that don't meet the highest standards of the fresh market and would otherwise
have gone to waste. In mid-2005, the cooperative forecast that the drying facility would bring in additional
revenues of up to $94,300.
The members of Agrodvir made $145,000 in gross revenue their very first year. The cooperative has also
developed relationships with several processing plants, including Vattyus, which it easily supplied tons
of potatoes, carrots, bulb onions, white cabbage and Brussels sprouts. In 2005, the cooperative is
fulfilling a major contract with Intermarket Wholesale Company, among others.
Print-friendly version of this page (244kb - PDF)
Click here for high-res photo
Back to Top ^ | 
RSS Feed for Recent Telling Our Story Updates
