First, the company aims at making profits, and the cooperative is a mutual economic organization. A cooperative is a mutual-aid economic organization based on farmers' contracted management, in which producers and operators of similar agricultural products or providers and users of similar agricultural production and operation services voluntarily unite and manage democratically. Its purpose is to provide members with services such as purchase and sale, processing, transportation, warehousing, technology and information, so that members can enter the market together and form an aggregated scale economy, thereby saving transaction costs, enhancing market competitiveness, improving economic efficiency and increasing members' income. Therefore, the main purpose of cooperatives is to provide services for their members, although cooperatives may also make profits in providing services. Of course, as one of the important market players, cooperatives also operate externally and need to make profits, but this is not their main purpose. External operations and profits are subordinate to providing services to their members.
Second, the membership system is not high. Although it is voluntary for shareholders to join the company and members to join the cooperative, the owners and users of the cooperative are the same, that is, members join the cooperative by using the organization to provide services; Under the company system, owners and users are separated, and shareholders do not need to use the company's services. For example, cooperative members who buy agricultural means of production are farmers who want to buy high-quality and cheap agricultural materials through cooperatives; Shareholders of agricultural materials distribution companies want to distribute agricultural materials, and they don't want to use agricultural materials themselves. For another example, the owners of agricultural products sales cooperatives are farmers who provide agricultural products, while the shareholders of agricultural products sales companies do not necessarily provide agricultural products themselves.
Third, the threshold for running a cooperative is lower than that for running a company. The Law on Farmers' Specialized Cooperatives has very loose provisions on the contribution of cooperatives. Farmers may or may not contribute to cooperatives. However, the company has a minimum registered capital requirement.
Four, the shareholders of the company can not withdraw their capital contribution, and the cooperative implements the principle of "freedom to withdraw from the cooperative". The company law does not allow shareholders to withdraw their capital contribution after the company is established. You can only transfer the shares of the company to others. Cooperatives, on the other hand, implement the principle of "freedom of withdrawal", but they cannot transfer their capital contribution and membership to others.