Supreme Court: "Agricultural Cooperative Members Also Have the Right to Inspect Cooperative Accounting Books"

Supreme Court, Seocho-dong, Seoul / Photo by Honam Moon munonam@

[Asia Economy Reporter Kim Daehyun] The Supreme Court has ruled that members of an agricultural cooperative have the right to inspect the cooperative corporation's accounting books to examine its operations and financial status.

On the 9th, the Supreme Court's Third Division (Presiding Justice Kim Jaehyung) announced that it upheld the lower court's ruling in favor of members of an agricultural cooperative in Chungbuk who filed a lawsuit demanding access to the cooperative corporation's books.

In 2019, members of a Hanwoo-specialized agricultural cooperative requested the cooperative to disclose accounting books for the three years starting from 2016.

However, the cooperative refused, citing its internal regulations. The regulations stipulated that "the tax adjustment statement must be kept at the office and disclosed to members," thus denying members the right to inspect accounting books other than the tax adjustment statement.

Both the first and second trials ruled in favor of the plaintiffs. Since matters not stipulated in the Agricultural Management Entity Act regarding agricultural cooperative corporations should be governed by the provisions on cooperatives in the Civil Act, Article 710 of the Civil Act states that "each member may inspect the cooperative's operations and financial status at any time."

Furthermore, the court stated that the cooperative's regulations "cannot be interpreted as a complete prohibition on members' inspection of accounting books other than the tax adjustment statement," and pointed out that interpreting the regulations as "only the tax adjustment statement must be disclosed" would render members' rights to inspect operations and financial status meaningless.

The Supreme Court agreed with this judgment. The court said, "There is no basis to recognize that the plaintiffs made this request with an improper purpose or in violation of the principle of good faith," and dismissed the cooperative's appeal, stating that "the lower court's judgment did not misinterpret the legal principles regarding the right to inspect and copy the books."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.