Skookum Food Provisioners’ Cooperative began in November 2009. The founding team came together around the idea of an organization which would help people become more self-reliant in providing for their own food needs and the needs of their families, friends, neighbourhoods, and community. We chose to structure the organization as a cooperative, because cooperatives are explicitly member-focused and based on solid values and principles.
After some discussion of the pros and cons, we decided to incorporate as a community service (i.e., not-for-profit) cooperative. This means that Skookum is able to generate a surplus through its activities, but that any surplus must not be distributed among its members. Surpluses will go towards creating a reserve of funds, towards furthering Skookum’s purposes, and towards worthy projects in the community, as determined by our members.
Our formal Statement of Purpose reads as follows:
The purpose of the Association is to:
- Help its members acquire and share the knowledge, skills, and resources they need in order to
- grow, gather, raise, and catch healthful food as locally as possible;
- preserve, store, prepare, and share the bounty;
- Build a strong community and a diverse local food economy based on mutual support, fair prices, living wages, and respect for the natural systems which sustain life.
This statement indicates our strong commitment to empowering our members to work better together in order to become more able to provide for themselves, their families, friends, neighbours, and community.
