Prof. dr. ir. Gert van Dijk

Gert van Dijk is Emeritus Professor of Cooperative Business Administration and Management at Nyenrode Business Universiteit. He was the Director General of the National Council of Cooperatives and President of the European Confederation of Agricultural Cooperatives in the EU. In these positions he became actively involved with national and international cooperative businesses and investor owned companies, as well as financial, governmental and non-governmental organizations. He was also a member of the Board of Directors of Rabobank.

He studied Animal Husbandry and Genetics at the Agricultural University of Wageningen and Economics at the University of Aberdeen, Scotland, where he also earned his PhD. He lectured at both these universities for a number of years. His research focuses on cooperatives and complex ownership structures. He recently developed a new generation cooperative structure which is also known as the multiple stakeholder business cooperative. In particular the issues of member influence and member commitment have been addressed thoroughly by new combinations of legal structures and behavioral aspects of good governance. By using experimental designs and realistic game simulations ‘on the job data analyses’ are applied to improve member reciprocity and thereby the performance of the cooperative firm.

By applying the above mentioned new generation coops a new research program has been launched with regard to applying cooperative structures to attract impact investors in developing economies.