ITAI^Y - CO-OPERATION AND ASSOCIATION 



of spontaneous co-operation, resulting on the necessity of using milk in- 

 dustrially. The collective organizations appeared in the mountains where 

 society is most divided and combination is necessary to profit. They are 

 first found in Agordino and Friulia ; then gradually they spread over the 

 whole Alpine chain, penetrating into the provinces of Sondrio, Como, Bre- 

 scia, Novara and Turin ; they extended into the plain, to Treviso, Vicenza, 

 Reggio d'^Emilia and Parma ; and finally, little by httle, they conquered, as 

 we shall see, almost all the northern regions. 



§ I. The VARIOUS FORMS OF COI,I,ECTIVE DAIRIES. 



Historically collective dairies have three different forms. The first 

 and most rudimentary of these involved the reciprocal lending of milk on a 

 system by which families took turns (i). Some small producers of milk 

 combined and mutually lent each other milk in an order previously estab- 

 lished in order that each might treat a larger quantity at one time. Thus the 

 loss was avoided which results on the daily handhng of small quantities insuf- 

 ficient to allow of the production of good cheese, or on too long preserva- 

 ation of milk with a view to accumulating a certain quantity of it. The 

 milk was treated successively in the house of every member. The member 

 whose turn it was provided premises, labour, implements, combustibles, 

 rennet, etc., and then deducted a certain quantity of the product, in addi- 

 tion to that derived from his own milk, as compensation for his work ; or, 

 more commonly, he was in the position of having previously supphed 

 his fellow- members with as much milk as he received on the day or days 

 on which his own turn fell, and therefore appropriated the whole product. 



It is however easy to see that the draw-backs to this system were 

 not few. Above all it obliged each member to have premises and imple- 

 ments sufficient to treat all the milk produced by the society. »Secondly 

 the products could not be uniform but were affected by the greater or less 

 skill of whoever manipulated them. Thirdly milk was collected for the 

 profit of different individuals at different seasons, and the return obtained 

 by individuals therefore varied markedly. These drawbacks suggested a 

 better S3^stem wliich is still extensively followed, especially in the Alpine 

 districts. By this each member to whom the products come in turn sup- 

 plies the wood, rennet and salt ; but, in distinction to the plan followed 

 under the earlier system, the milk is treated on premises and with imple- 

 ments and utensils held in common, under the direction of an expert in 

 cheesemaking chosen by the society. 



However under this system also, although in less measure, each mem- 

 ber gains or loses according to whether his turn falls in more or less pro- 

 pitious seasons and the treatment of the milk is consequently more or less 



(i) This form still exists to a limited extent in some districts but it is destined to disappear 

 completely. 



