Last Big Co-op Conversation for 2012

University of Sydney's Co-operative Research Group has two events to end IYC 2012 on the Friday, 14 December, 3-5pm. The venue for both activities will be Darlington Centre School Building, University of Sydney, Meeting Room 7.

The first will be a seminar by Peter Gates on the "The Petersham Model for Co-operatives and Housing" at 3pm.

The second event will be a launch (in co-operation with the Business and Labour History Group) on the CRG website of Gary Lewis’s new book entitled Land Water and Co-operation in the Australian Rice Industry to the 1990s at 4pm. Gary Lewis is Australia’s leading co-operative historian with five major books examining the history of the Australian Co-operative Movement. For further details concerning Gary Lewis see below.

Housing Co-ops

The topic will be "The Petersham Model for Co-operatives and Housing" by Peter Gates (The Mercury Centre). In this seminar, Peter will look at the nature of co-operative involvement in housing. He will present an alternate approach to the use of co-operatives in the provision of housing in Australia, outlining a model for shared equity housing using a co-operative structure where ownership of the residences is by the co-operative, along with some research questions that it raises.

Peter is a co-operative practitioner who has been involved for over 25 years in co-operative development. As CEO of The Mercury Centre, he works with groups building collaborative enterprises, people working together for a common goal, assisting them in areas such as concept development; enterprise definition and creation; strategic and business planning; goal setting and situational analysis; governance reviews and renewal; and constitution/rules development.

Book Launch

Gary Lewis has made a significant contribution to an understanding of Australia’s co-operative movement. Gary has been writing and speaking about co-operation and co-operatives since 1983 when he gave a paper on the NSW Co-operatives Act at the ANU’s Centre for Continuing Education’s Working Together conference. Since then, he has contributed over 45 books, reports, articles and conference presentations including books on the history of Australian farmers’ co-operatives and credit unions. His PhD. from the ANU focused on history of Rochdale consumer co-operatives in NSW and was subsequently published as a book.

RSVP

For catering purposes, please email [email protected] by noon Tuesday, 11 December as to whether you are attending either or both events.