Governor signs bills allowing co-ops to promote farm products

The legislation encourages private investment in rural technology by allowing the formation of limited liability cooperatives. Such co-ops would have to be approved by the commissioner of the state Agriculture Department.

State law had prohibited non-farm investors from injecting capital in such enterprises.

Bredesen said several other states allow similar arrangements.

“One of the things I want to accomplish is to help in economic development of rural areas, specifically to help farmers, particularly the smaller family farmers,” the governor said after the bill-signing ceremony.

“They need to move up the food chain more and be able to get more of the money that comes from the product. There’s a huge difference in what they get paid for a product and what it eventually appears in a grocery store for,” Bredesen said.

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On the Net:

Read Public Chapter 534 at http://www.state.tn.us/sos/acts/103/pub/pc0534.pdf