History

The Northcountry Cooperative Development Fund (NCDF) was started in 1978 when several Twin Cities area natural food consumer and worker cooperatives pooled about $4,000 of their savings to form their own loan fund. At that time, NCDF was known as North Country Development Fund. Their aim was to establish a self-help loan fund that would encourage the growth and development of community-owned cooperative enterprises throughout the upper Midwest. They believed that promotion of cooperatives would help people to use and direct their resources toward the creation of a better society.

Since its founding as one of the first such community development loan funds in the country, NCDF has made millions of dollars in capital available to a range of consumer, worker, housing and producer cooperatives and their members. Over the years, many cooperatives, individuals and institutions have made loans to NCDF. NCDF, in turn, reloans that money, helping individuals achieve home and business ownership, and helping cooperatives expand, upgrade equipment, add new product lines and carry out a wide range of projects. While the role of non-cooperative institutions has become increasingly important as a source of capital, NCDF’s cooperative and individual members still provide almost one-fourth of the funds used for lending, which is a self-help aspect that is unique among loan funds.