A drug cooperative is a type of village drug fund, set up to solve inappropriate drug use in the community, with the principle of people participation by voluntarily sharing their money as shareholders. The field visit described here was to the drug fund at the Baan None Kah village.

The village drug cooperative was started in 1986 with initial one-time capital of 1 000 bahts from the Government and from selling shares to voluntary members. Each member has to buy share(s) at 10 bahts per share with a maximum limit of 10 shares per person. At the moment, the drug cooperative has 48 members and about 90 shares altogether.

Drugs supply is purchased at the Community Drug Store at Soongnern Hospital with a 25% discount from the purchasing price that the hospital paid. There are two types of drugs available, 20-30 items of household drugs and seven items of herbal medicine.

The revenue generated is approximately 900 to 1 000 bahts per month (there is no exemption). Basically, drugs are sold at a fixed price as labelled on the package. The profits are divided into three parts: 40% as dividend for shareholders, 40-50% for the sellers responsible for all the business management and another 10 to 20% put in a bank account. The community committee is responsible for the profit sharing decisions.

For accountability, an information system is developed which includes the financial aspects and drug use information. For drug use data, the name of drug sold, diagnosis of the symptoms and price charged are recorded. The record will be monitored by the community pharmacists or the assistants. The financial aspects should be reported by the volunteers to the members at least once a year.

It can be concluded that this drug cooperative at Soongnern District is one of the successful examples of community self-reliance as the first contact for PHC with strong community participation. Sustainability of the programme depends on the effectiveness of the management system, which includes capable, highly motivated and dedicated volunteers as well as adequate supervision by health personnel at district level.