Page 414 - The_story_of_the_C._W._S._The_jubilee_history_of_the_cooperative_wholesale_society,_limited._1863-1913_(IA_storyofcwsjubill00redf) (1)_Neat

—
The Story of the C.W.S.
Manchester offices of the English federation, was appointed
Continental representative, and the prospects seemed bright. But the
experiment of a regular visiting was given up almost before it had
developed. The Continental Wholesales, having few manufactures
or none to supply in exchange, did not appreciate a buying that
inevitably would have been all on one side, and the sellers, perhaps,
were not free from British insularity. However, the export
department has not been given up, and periodical visits are paid
from Manchester to the European wholesale and chief retail societies,
while from Canada in particular a promising, regular demand has
come unsolicited. Meanwhile, the co-operation of consumers
continues to march forward, both in Canada and upon the
Continent. The political differences which maintained in France
two wholesale societies, each economically weak, has been overcome
to the extent of these two amalgamating. Austria and Russia are
regions of development, and the smaller countries by combination
could exercise great buying powers. And the German C.W.S. at no
distant date may outrival the English; already it has important
manufactures of its own. The Year Book of International Co-operation
for 1913, an official publication of the International Co-operative
AlHance, said:
We may safely assert that co-operative wholesale purchase was carried on
in 1910 by national organisations for this purpose on behalf of at least five
million consumers. Great Britain alone was responsible for nearly half this
number, the other half being Continental co-operators.
An international exchange of productions and a large development
of international co-operative exchange generally is in the future,
but, to judge from present signs, if it so remains fifty years hence
the record will say little for the spirit and enterprise and fraternal
faith of co-operators.
We now come to the most recent large event m the general
history of the C.W.S. , which is the development of insurance. By
all logical divisions it belongs to this chapter, yet the account
cannot now be added without an inordinate extension. So the
story of general progress in the new century shall be cut in two, for
sometimes one must consider the reader.

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