Murray Fulton, professor in the Johnson-Shoyama Graduate School of Public Policy, has been named director of the University of Saskatchewan's Centre for the Study of Co-operatives for a five-year term, effective January 1, 2014. Fulton is currently a Fellow in Agricultural Co-operation with the centre, after previously serving as the centre’s director from 1995 to 2000.
With degrees from the University of California, University of Oxford, Texas A&M University and the University of Saskatchewan, Murray has research and teaching interests in a number of areas, including industrial organization, agricultural industry analysis, co-operative theory and community development. He is the co-author of a number of books and reports, including Canadian Agricultural Policy and Prairie Agriculture, and has written numerous articles and papers on industrial organization, co-operatives and agricultural policy. Murray has worked on research projects for the Economic Council of Canada, has served as a consultant to the Saskatchewan government and the Federal/Provincial Task Force on the Role of Co-operatives and Government in Community Development, and was named a Fellow of the Canadian Agricultural Economics Society. Most recently, he was part of a team of faculty from the university to be awarded $1M from Federated Co-operatives Limited to explore co-operative business development in rural and Aboriginal communities.
Fulton will succeed director Lou Hammond Ketilson, who will continue her involvement with the centre as a Fellow in Co-operative Management. Lou has ongoing responsibilities as the lead of two large research projects: a 2010–15 SSHRC-funded initiative on the impact of co-operatives and credit unions in Canada and a 2013–16 IDRC project on sustainable rural development in Africa. Both are in partnership with the Canadian Co-operative Association.