!!!landwirtschaftliche Genossenschaften

Agricultural Cooperatives, Raiffeisen cooperatives, economic self-help 
associations in the field of agriculture. They replaced the live-stock 
breeding and trading associations of agricultural societies ( 
Landwirtschaftsgesellschaften) which were established after the 
peasants´ liberation in 1848. They date back to the model of the 
German social reformer F. W. Raiffeisen (1818-1888), who founded 
the first savings banks and loan societies (today  Raiffeisenkassen) 
in Anhausen in the Rhineland area in 1862. In Austria they emerged in 
1885 after pioneering work by G.  Marchet (1846-1916) and on the 
initiative of J. Mitscha von Maerheim (1828-1907), who was a member of 
the Landtag as well as a bank manager and therefore knew about the 
credit problems of peasants in the 2%%sup nd/%  half of 19%%sup th/%  
century. The first agricultural cooperative was founded in Muehldorf 
(Lower Austria) by mayor E. Vergani (1848-1915). The establishment of 
further agricultural cooperatives such as  Warehouse Cooperatives and 
dairy and live-stock processing co-operatives followed, based on the 
organisational structure of the banks.

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In 1998, 674 independent Raiffeisen banks, 129 warehouse cooperatives, 
40 dairy cooperatives and several other processing cooperatives (a 
total of 1754 cooperatives) were part of the agricultural 
cooperatives. These independent cooperatives are members of the 
Austrian  Raiffeisenverband which is the interest group of 
agricultural cooperatives, usually with provincial or federal head 
offices.

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Agricultural cooperatives are economic bodies with a democratic 
structure; in 1998 they had about 2,178,997 members and employed about 
44,000 persons.


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