Westmalle deco-operativises

The frequent sips I take of my favourite beer – Westmalle Tripel – will henceforth taste less sweet. I have been devastated to find out that the brewery has stopped being a co-operative. On 29^th December last, it passed a resolution saying because “the object of the company does not correspond to the definition of cooperative company provided by article 6:1 of the Companies and Associations Code” it would adopt new statutes as a BV (private limited company).

Its new statutes provide that the Abbot shall be a director, but are silent (in good Trappist fashion) on who the members are or how many votes they have. However they do still say that “the company can contribute to the development of social economy activities that belong to the monastic economy of the Trappist abbey in Westmalle or can promote them in the broadest sense of the word.”

It has long been a thorn in the side of the Belgian co-operative movement that most enterprises that were technically registered as co-operatives were not so in practice. The reform of the companies and associations law puts an end to ‘false co-operatives’. The new law abolishes CVBAs and renames them simply CVs – coöperatieve vennootschappen – which really must follow the ICA principles. If they can’t make the grade, next January (2024) they will be downgraded to BVs by default. This is all explained here.

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[1] Seer also: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/mar/26/belgium-trappist-beers-under-threat