CO-OPERATIVE MOVEMENT DURING THE WAR I7 



This importance and development of the movement towards co-oper- 

 ative consumption in Russia has a direct relation to the war. Co-oper- 

 ation in consumption did not arise when the war broke out nor was it a con- 

 sequence of the war. The work of propaganda and organization certainly 

 went on for twenty years. But the true success and veritable national im- 

 portance of this form of co-operation date only from quite recent 3'ears and 

 are a result of the pressure exercised by the crisis in the food supply. Ac- 

 cording to information, very incomplete and therefore below the truth, 

 which dates from 191 6 the turnover of this branch of co operation was then 

 fifteen hundred million roubles. 



A movement parallel to that of co-operation is found in the organiza- 

 tion of unions of districts, provinces, regions and of a central union. On 

 I January 1917 the unions of co-operative institutions for consumption 

 numbered 250, of which 170 had been formed in the previous year. They are 

 largely mixed in t^'pe and unite co-operative institutions of various cate- 

 gories. 



The number of co-operative institutions belonging to the unions 

 has increased at an exceptional rate. The Union of Co-operative Societies 

 of Moscow, which is becoming the centre of co-operative consumption in 

 Russia and is on the poiiit of solving the problem of forming a single natio- 

 nal co-operative institution for consumption, had 1,734 members in 1915 

 and 3,164 in 1916. The membership of the Union of Vologda increased from 

 222 to 600 ; that of Perm, which was formed of thirteen societies in 1912, in- 

 cluded 500 of them in 1916, 308 having joined during 1916, etc. 



The total number of co-operative societies grouped in the unions was 

 4,000 on I January 1916 and 12,500 on i Januan,- 1917, which is to say that 

 no less than 60 per cent, of the co-operative consumers' societies have 

 adhered to the unions. The turnover of all the unions was 257 million 

 roubles on i Januar>^ 1917 as against 70 million in 1915. The Union of 

 the Co-operative Societies of Moscow should be signalized, its turnover 

 having surpassed even optimistic anticipations. In 1914 the value of the 

 goods it sold -was 10 million roubles, in 1915 it was 22.8 million roubles, 

 in 1916 it surpassed 85 million, and this year it will, on a modest compu- 

 tation, reach 145,568,500 roubles, thus placing the union in the first rank 

 of the co-operative stores of the whole world. 



As appears from the following table the large majority of Russian co- 

 operative societies are rural. To anahse in detail the activit}' of the 

 Central Union of Russian Co-operative Societies, by which name the Union 

 of Moscow is now known, is therefore of the highest importance for the 

 study of the economic and commercial life of the Russian countr>'. 



