The Growth Of The Co-op

The HPCC was incorporated in 1999 by five HPWPS directors. Its purpose is to provide a structure for carrying out business activities in the watershed and the Co-op is the tenure holder for the Community Forest Agreement K1B.

Any resident of Harrop-Procter may purchase a share and the share is for the life of the resident and is non- transferable. Directors are elected at the annual AGM and at least half of the HPCC directors must also be HPWPS directors.

The co-op grew to 98 members in its first year of operation and at present has 114 members.

Like most co-ops, each member has one vote. A co-op was chosen over a regular corporate model, where voting power is derived from the number of shares owned, which may have eventually given some community and co-op members more power than others.

It is a "not-for-profit" co-op because shareholders receive no dividends. Decisions are made by the membership and are to be for the benefit of the community as a whole.

Surverying forests to develop eco-system based management plan.

A co-operative operates on the basis of one share one vote.

Shareholders receive no dividends and decisions are made by the membership and are to be for the benefit of the community.

The co-operative operates through committees comprised of directors and interested community members. It retains a forest manager, office coordinator and bookkeeper. Day to day operations are run by a management committee comprised of directors and staff.

Volunteers are still a large factor in the success of the project and they contribute on average 200 hours monthly.

Milling wood harvested in the local watersheds.

1. Forestry & Value Added Production
The Co-op operates it's forestry division under the name "Harrop Procter Forest Products." The forest products division is charged with cutting and milling trees from the Community Forest, and to market them as eco-certified logs and lumber. We are enacting plans to develop chain of custody manufacturing. This is preferred to exporting logs and lumber to other centers as it will provide local employment.

Eco-Tourism

The co-op also plans to develop educational, low impact tourism in the watershed, and have hired Youth Employment Teams to upgrade existing hiking trails. Some work has already been done on local trails.

Maps of our local trails network are available from the Co-op office, or from the Procter store.