2) POSTURAS FORZADAS DE COLUMNA VERTEBRAL Y ARTICULACIONES:

The total number of cooperative members in 2009 was 122192. Although the majority of cooperatives involve agricultural ones, the largest participation in the total number of cooperative members had youth and students cooperatives – 62.4%, whereas the participation of agricultural cooperatives was 25.5%. Share of other cooperatives was 12.2%. Observed by gender, 64.1% are men and 35.9% women. Participation of women is less than participation of men in of cooperative types. <the biggest participation of women was in youth and students cooperatives – 41.2% and in consumer – 38.2% (Milojic, et al., 2011., 30).

It should be pointed out that above mentioned figures do not show the real economic capacity and extremely high possibilities of cooperative sector in Serbia, especially in agriculture. Based on foregoing, it can be concluded that the results of operations in cooperative sector in Serbia are in reverse proportion to their real capacity and possibilities.

According to data of the Cooperative Union of Serbia, from March 2014, 1.662 agricultural cooperatives are functional, whereas 938 are removed from the register. During 2010, 2011 and 2012, by applying the provisions on automatic bankruptcy, later assessed as unconstitutional, 783 cooperatives were removed and their property was transferred to the state ownership. Some of agricultural cooperatives have also been privatized, primarily those which worked in the frame of agricultural corporations. In 2013, 122 agricultural cooperatives were formed. Out of the total number of agricultural cooperatives, a bit more than 40% have been registered in Vojvodina, and the rest in the central part of Serbia

CONCLUSION

All given data unambiguously indicate the very difficult situation in the cooperative sector and picturesquely substantiate the ascertainment of problems that cooperatives and cooperative movement in Serbia are facing with, as well as their contemporary needs, as closer described above. The mentioned statistics data and facts speak about negative tendencies in the cooperative sector, which reflects in decrease of the number of cooperatives, individuals employed in them and cooperative resources, as well as in losses increase of the cooperative sector and its growing marginalization and passivity in the economic system of the Republic of Serbia.

The analytical research sector in Serbia observes the situation and development potentials through two dimensions. In the first dimension the particular attention is paid to the reasons for uniting and development potentials of the sector. The second dimension provides the analytic review of the state in cooperatives’property, directing a special focus to land as the basic property resource.

According to the attitudes of many institutions and individuals, the cooperative sector of the Republic of Serbia requires immediate intervention and reforms in several dimensions. The period from 2000 to 2013 was characterized by an accelerated privatization process of social capita and the implementation of a series of systematic reforms, which had mostly bypassed cooperatives (Novaković, 2014, p. 83).

The problems that cooperatives in Serbia are facing with can be systematized as follows:

 Inadequate and outdated legislation – from 1989 and 1996 even does not conform with the way this area is regulated in the EU member countries, which also prevents the use of pre-accession EU funds for these purposes. Additionally there is a distinguished problem that cooperative unions have the monopoly over the performance of the cooperative audit.

 The absence of fiscal policy measures and other forms of support to cooperatives as a specific form of business. These forms of support are common in developed European countries. States have recognized a number of socio-economic aspects of the uniting and as such have introduced a number of incentives in business operations of cooperatives.

 Small working capital and reduced possibility of credit funds use, especially when it comes to "young cooperatives";

 Unfamiliarity with the basic cooperative principles and bad historical connotation of the very concept of cooperatives and cooperative sector contribute to agriculturists’ feeling of distrust and animosity towards organizing and uniting into cooperatives;

 Poor management capacities in cooperatives. Cooperatives management is often overtaken by cooperative members themselves, who are not educated in a domain of modern financial and economic flows and cannot meet all the challenges imposed to cooperatives by the market;

 The cooperative sector has remained out of the new institutional and economic reforms focus, and the transitional political solutions have not covered the specifics of the cooperative sector in a sufficient measure;  Cooperatives were excluded from the privatization process, which was

supposed to give them an additional incentive for strengthening and development;

 Unsolved problems in property-legal issues, unequal access to capital market and devastated effects of the grey economy all influenced the slowdown of the cooperative movement reforming;

 The identity of cooperative property and trust in the cooperative system have been lost;

 There are not the unique mechanisms for monitoring the cooperative sector conditions and no ministry owns the precise and reliable data about the situation in this sector;

 Support programs to the cooperative sector offered by certain ministries in the previous years were executed on ad hoc basis, being mutually inconsistent and systematically disordered;

 Exclusion from the market of final food products - agricultural cooperatives do not have their own processing capacities;

 Technical and technological obsolescence of storage capacity;  Lack of investment in maintenance and renovation of the equipment;

 Difficult access to capital market and with regard to this they are in unfavorable position comparing with small and medium legal entities and other participants;

 Inter-cooperative collaboration is undeveloped and reduced mostly to cooperatives in a narrow local surrounding;

 Unfavorable image of human resources in quantitative and qualitative sense;  The number of existing producers associations is exceptionally big, but they

are poorly developed and their role and activities are minor, with the low level of professionalism and lack of managerial personnel with low negotiating power.

Besides that, from the point of social inclusion and poverty reduction (as one of the elementary issue in the Republic of Serbia) and new cooperative types creation, the fact is that social cooperatives, as one of the pillars of social economy in the Republic of Serbia are not legally recognized and arranged, and thus this significant business-institutional form of social entrepreneurship is actually marginalized. This greatly hinders the creation of new and development of existing cooperatives. All presented reasons and the data unambiguously speak in favor of the reform of the legal regulation of the cooperative sector. What is necessary is the reform legal framework for cooperatives and cooperative sector, their transformation and promotions, recognition as a legal form for new types of entrepreneurship, not as something that is out of date and survived, which means the overall cooperatives revitalization. Legal provisions should provide incentives for the cooperative sector, control of those incentives use, prevention of abuse and their sanctioning.

The necessity of reforming the cooperative sector in the Republic of Serbia especially gained in importance in the conditions of food prices increase and demand for it, the expected liberalization of the market and the growing competitiveness need, as well as from the aspect of society and social changes in which cooperatives can be an important actor. The concept of cooperatives and uniting is regarded as a model to improve the system of knowledge transfer and human resources potential development.

The new legal framework should have positive effects on the users of products and services of cooperatives (individuals and legal entities), because the applying of the stipulated solutions should lead to the professionalization of cooperatives and higher quality of their products and services they provide.

LITERATURE

1. Law on Banks („Official Gazette RS“, no. 107/05, 91/10 the 14/15). 2. Law on Cooperatives („Official Gazette SRJ“, no. 41/96 and 12/98 and „

Official Gazette RS“, no. 101/05 – other law and 34/06).

3. Law on Cooperatives („Official Gazette SRS“, br. 57/89 and „ Official Gazette RS “, no. 67/93, 46/95 and 101/05 – other law).

4. Milojic,a.,Ciric,R., Smolcic,M., Karamarkovic, S.,Pavlovic, M., Simonovic, V.,Stevanovski, B.(2011). Satellite Account of the cooperative sector in the Republic of Serbia, 2009, Statistical Office of the Republic of Serbia, (Belgrade, ISBN 978-86-6161-004-2, COBISS.SR-ID 181335308

http://webrzs.stat.gov.rs/WebSite/userFiles/file/Nacionalni/Satelitski_racuni.pdf 5. Novaković, N., (2014), Udruživanje kao faktor održivog razvoja poljoprivrede

kao lokalne zajednice, master rad, Novi Sad, Univerzitet u Novom Sadu Poljoprivredni fakultet, http://polj.uns.ac.rs/wp-

content/uploads/2014/11/Novakovic_Nebojsa.pdf

6. Strategy of Agriculture and Rural Development of The Republic of Serbia 2014- 2024 (“Official Gazette RS “, no. 85/2014) http://uap.gov.rs/wp-

content/themes/uap/STRATEGIJA%202014-2020%20.pdf.

7. The general rules of the Cooperative Union of Yugoslavia ("Off. Gazette", Nos. 25/98 and "Off. Gazette", no. 1/2003 - Constitutional Charter)

8. The National Rural Development Program 2011-2013. („Official Gazette RS“, br. 15/2011)

http://www.ruralinfoserbia.rs/dokumenta/Nacionalni%20program%20ruralnog% 20razvoja.pdf

9. The rules of cooperative audit of the Cooperative Union of Yugoslavia ("Off. Gazette", Nos. 26/98 and 28/98 - corr. and "Off. Gazette", no. 1/2003 - Constitutional Charter).

THE LEGAL PROTECTION OF TECHNICAL