October is National Cooperative Month and USDA traditionally releases its annual report on cooperatives to coincide with the observance.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack has announced that the nation’s farmer, rancher and fishery cooperatives posted record income and revenue in 2014, previewing a USDA report to be released later this month that shows cooperatives earned $6.5 billion in net income and generated $246.7 billion in total revenue last year. Net income increased 16.5 percent while revenue rose 0.4 percent from 2013. Co-ops set records for income and revenue in 2014 for the fourth year in a row.

“The nation’s co-ops are essential to the U.S. economy and to rural America,” Vilsack said. “The income they generate is reinvested or returned to members who spend it in their local communities. USDA is proud to continue its support of the cooperative movement.”

USDA also released the latest top 100 ag cooperative rankings in terms of business and assets. According to the rankings, Minnesota-based CHS Inc. remains the nation’s largest cooperative posting $43 billion in revenue in 2014. Kansas City-based Dairy Farmers of America, with $18 billion in total revenue, moved up from number three to number two this year while Land O’Lakes in St. Paul dropped to third place with $15 billion in revenue.

Illinois-based GROWMARK retained its fourth place ranking for 2014 with $10.4 billion in revenue and Ag Processing Inc. of Omaha rounded out the top five with $5.2 billion.