Responding to Business Succession Issues and Crises by Converting to Cooperatives
Canadian Realities and Possibilities
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.29173/cjnser.2021v12n2a550Keywords:
Business conversion to cooperatives; Small- and medium-sized enterprises; Succession; Business crisis; COVID-19; Canada; Social economy organizations / Conversion d’entreprises en coopératives; Petites et moyennes entreprises; Relève; Crise organisationnelle; COVID-19; Canada; Entreprises de l’économie socialeAbstract
Most of Canada’s 1.2 million small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) have been affected by the pandemic, compounding serious issues facing Canada’s economy, including the potential for large-scale business closures due to the growing number of retirement-aged owners without a formal succession plan. One social economy option in Canada to save businesses and the jobs they provide is to sell them to employees or community members and convert them to cooperatives. The Conversion to Co-operatives Project set out to better understand business conversion to cooperatives (BCCs) in Canada and help the country’s co-op movement build BCC capacity. This article outlines the project’s key findings to date.
RÉSUMÉ
La pandémie a entraîné des conséquences sur la plupart des 1,2 millions de petites et moyennes entreprises au Canada, aggravant de sérieux problèmes pour l’économie du pays, y compris la possibilité de fermetures d’entreprises à grande échelle causées par le nombre croissant de propriétaires au seuil de la retraite qui n’ont aucun plan de relève. Au Canada, une option provenant de l’économie sociale pour sauver les entreprises et les emplois qu’elles fournissent serait de les vendre à des employés ou à des membres de la communauté et de les convertir en coopératives. Le Projet de conversion en coopératives a cherché à mieux comprendre la conversion d’entreprise en coopérative (CEC) au Canada et à aider le mouvement coopératif du pays à accroître la capacité en CEC. Cet article présente les données clés du projet à ce jour.
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