NORCO is currently Australia’s largest dairy co-operative and has extensive operations in Northern NSW and Southern Queensland. NORCO was founded in 1893 and established a central creamery at Byron Bay in 1895. It moved its headquarters from Byron Bay to Lismore in 1962. It began operating a rural retail business network in 1943 at Lismore, which has grown to 28 locations and provides essential agricultural products.
NORCO is also a strong promoter of co-operatives and has played important roles in co-operative federations at the national, state and local levels. NORCO encouraged the formation of a Northern Rivers Co-operative Alliance in 2014 to represent the interests of co-operatives in the local regions. NORCO highlights the value of the co-operative business model by supporting community activities such as food fairs, agricultural shows and sporting events.
It assists local businesses by supporting ‘buy local’ campaigns. NORCO’s strong local links helped it defeat an effort to demutualise it in the 1990s when many significant Australian agricultural co-operatives were demutualised. While NORCO faced a 12.7 million record surplus for 2021, it faced losses of $41 million due to the devastating Lismore floods in February 2022, with major damage to its ice cream factory.
Consequently, NORCO obtaining A$46 million in federal and NSW government assistance to help rebuild the factory. Despite these challenges, NORCO and the National Farmers Federation released in March 2023 the National Farmer Wellbeing Report to highlight the mental illness challenges faced by farmers. NORCO by June 2024 had 190 member farms, 805 employees and an annual revenue of $768 million.
For further details please download Greg Patmore, Nikola Balnave and Olivera Marjanovic, A History of Australian Co-operatives 1828-2023.
