Celebrating Co-op Month in Nebraska

Local Nebraska co-ops provide many services for farmers across the state.

We caught up with Frontier Co-op General Manager Randy Robeson at the cooperative's Mead Agronomy Center. Randy talked about the benefits of co-ops and the services they provide. "The great thing is the co-op is owned by the farmer, he's the member-owner," Randy said. "We bring services to them both in the production of their agriculture, to livestock, to their energy needs, to drying their grain. We provide services and technology that nobody else does."

Randy says the cooperative system was built by farmers. "Agriculture is getting so high-tech, that farmers need someone like the co-op even more," Randy said. "We build facilities for speed to help farmers get in and out faster, we help them raise another 20-bushel an acre, we help the rate of gain on their livestock be a quarter per pound a day more. That comes from relationships and that comes from service," Randy said.

Some of what happens at the Mead Agronomy Center in terms of service is that liquid fertilizer is sold to farmers, dry fertilizer is sold, there is also work done on crop protection and seed sales. "When our owners succeed, we succeed, period," Randy said.

"Services are everything in agriculture today," Randy said. "We are going to be here where if the farmer needs help with spraying, we can help him catch up. We can help him soil select, we can do so many more things for him. We are individually giving service to that one producer, that one guy, and helping him be successful, and producers can see that," Randy said.

In the next installment of our series on cooperatives, we'll look at the facilities that local cooperatives offer to farmers.