contact from the Cooperative Development Institute, a sister organization of Coop Life.
A beta (testing) version of the directory was ready for release in December 2004. The
directory received a professional visual redesign and is now fully public and ready to be
handed over to Cooperative Life for regular maintenance.
Work began on a second tool suggested by the survey results: a way for cooperative
organizations to post announcements about joint purchasing opportunities, transactions,
and get-togethers. There was not enough time to develop this tool into a working
prototype, and in addition it did not benefit from the same initial boost enjoyed by the
directory of starting with a large amount of useful information. But plans are still in place
to continue to develop the relationship-building potential of the cooperative directory.
The project ran exclusively on volunteer effort and free or donated resources. This
method had both advantages and limitations. On the plus side, a lot was accomplished
with very little, and members of the community participated in the project. On the
downside, the amount that could be accomplished was unpredictable and limited by the
availability of volunteer time and skills.
At this point, the cooperative directory--named REGINA, the Regional Index of
Cooperation--gives users a way to find all different types of organizations involved in
building a cooperative economy throughout the U.S. Because the website uses wiki
technology, users can also easily add and modify entries, making the directory
progressively more accurate and comprehensive over time. Geographical functionality
allows search by address and display of results on a map.
Regina receives hundreds of hits a week. Much work remains to connect the various
cooperative organizations with this tool and make it more useful and responsive to their
needs. In the future, organizations helping to make the economy work for people should
be able to use the directory and other tools to buy from, sell to, and connect with other
cooperative organizations--thereby creating a truly vibrant, sustainable, cooperative
economy.
At the November 13 opening of the 2003 Cooperative Life conference, "The Power of
Co-op Connections," held in Montpelier, Vermont, Sid Pobihushchy, internationally
known cooperative educator and board member of Co-op Atlantic, spoke about the twin
crises facing the world today.
The crisis of justice refers to the increasing impoverishment of the world's
population within the context of the Global Corporate Market Economy.
The crisis of nature refers to the increasing destruction of the world's
natural environment within that same context. (Pobihushchy 2003)