Translations:Місце крамниці кооперативи "Єдність"/2/en
The Ukrainian cooperative movement in Galicia was actively developing since the second half of the 19th century. At Prosvita reading rooms, they began to create shpikhlers (public granaries, originated from the Polish word śpichlerż), agricultural and industrial unions, and shops where community members could buy cheap and quality goods.
The boom of the cooperative movement in the first half of the 20th century was primarily associated with the active support of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church Metropolitan Andrei Sheptytsky. In his archpastoral message of 1904, he explicitly obliged priests to lead cooperative organizations locally. As a result, almost 1,500 different cooperatives operated in Galicia before the First World War.