12 ITALY - CO-OPERATION AND ASSOCIATION 



stimers and producers. We should note the co-operative societies of milk 

 producers of Brescia, Tortona, Rome and Turin, as well as that of Milan 

 which we have just cited. In Genoa there is an agriciiltural consortium (i) 

 which provides the town with the milk it receives from agricultural 

 members. The service for selling the milk is admirabl}' organized b}^ the 

 consortium. The experiment ma}- be called the largest and best of its 

 kind hitherto made in the country. 



Most Italian collective dairies, like those of which we have spoken, 

 are on the system of manufacture b}' turns, which is still the commonest, 

 but they are gradually being replaced by co-operative dairies having a 

 small production. "The dair}- of primitive form, working on the system of 

 turns ", says Cerlini in the study we have cited, " should succeed in meet- 

 ing better the fresh needs which follow on the change from this to the co- 

 operative form, as gradually the agricultural conditions of the districts 

 in which it is situated are transformed b}' new systems of agriculture and 

 intensified production, and as zootechnical conditions are modified by an 

 improvement in cattle-breeding aimed at increasing the yield of milk. It 

 is not only the conversion of the milk and the distribution of the product 

 which is now desired : a larger quantity' of milk is used in the dair^^ and 

 consequenth' its conversion results in a larger quantity- of dairy products, 

 which therefore have to be sold to outsiders so that the milk realizes a price 

 paid to the members no longer in cheese but in cash ". 



Dairies of the average tj'pe are found more or less everj^where in Upper 

 Italy, from Friulia to the valley of Aosta in Upper Ivombardy and Emilia : 

 on an average from three to six thousand quintals of milk are treated in 

 them annually, on well arranged special premises, supplied with modern 

 implements and utensils, in which scientific methods are followed. 



In the region of Emilia, which is that in which co-operative dairies of 

 the modern type are most extensively found, and especiall}^ in the district 

 of Reggio, dairies treating large quantities of milk are also found. For 

 example in 191 3 the dairy of IMassenzatico treated 6,993 quintals of milk. 

 In eight years it has been possible to obtain results allowing of production 

 on this scale, although at first only 3,425 quintals were treated. Other 

 dairies of the average type are found in the provinces of Reggio, Modena 

 and Parma. In the provinces of Vicenza, Treviso and Udine, in the dis- 

 trict of Novara and in Upper Piedmont organizations of the average type 

 are also found, scattered here and there among innumerable very small 

 dairies. 



§ 3. A TYPICAL EXAMPLE OF CO-OPERATIVK CHEESEMAKING. 



Such an example is provided by the Latteria Sociale Cooperativa di 

 Soresina in the province of Cremona. This societj' has incontestably one 



(i) See in this connection Monthly Bulletin of Economic and Social Intelligence, December 

 I9i5,pagc33," The Organization of the Agricultural Consortium of Genoa for the Sale of INIilk". 



