150 Cooperation in Agriculture 



ment. The associations of a community or of a state feder- 

 ate and form an agency which either markets the butter 

 for the local creameries under local brands or furnishes 

 the marketing facilities which the local associations use 

 in marketing their own product. In the primary dairy 

 states, the creameries in a county or a community may 

 form a local exchange to look after the problems that 

 affect them all alike, and these local exchanges, like the 

 district exchanges in the citrus industry in California, 

 may form a larger central agency to represent them in 

 the distribution and marketing of the butter. 



In brief, then, the cooperative creamery movement 

 starts with the dairyman as the unit ; the dairymen of 

 a community owning four hundred or more cows form an 

 association, on cooperative principles, build a factory 

 in which the cream of the members is assembled under 

 rules and regulations established by the association, and 

 is there made into butter and prepared for shipment. 

 These local associations form a district agency on coopera- 

 tive principles which looks after the local questions that 

 affect them all alike and which may act as a marketing 

 agency for them ; or, if the plan is more comprehensive, 

 the district agencies may form a central exchange which 

 acts as a brokerage agent for the district organizations, 

 operating at actual cost in furnishing the marketing facili- 

 ties, in the development of markets, in the handling of 

 the general public policy questions that affect all of 

 the associations and district agencies, and in providing 

 a system which operates towards the general upbuild- 

 ing of the dairy industry. It can employ traveling ex- 

 perts to assist the local butter-makers and the association 



