O que faz o sucesso das cooperativas agrícolas nos Países Baixos? 39 management, reduced member influence on operational decisions, found new sources of equity capital, and professionalized the supervisory bodies. On the latter point, cooperatives have included non-member experts in theses bodies, thereby strengthening their control capabilities. Another innovation has been the Member Council. Large cooperatives have introduced a Member Council of 50 to 100 members that has been given most of the rights and obligations of the General Assembly. Elected by and from all members, this Member Council consists of highly committed persons who are interested in the general affairs of the cooperative. The Member Council is also a good pool for new members of the BoD. To summarize, agricultural cooperatives in The Netherlands have introduced several innovative internal governance mechanisms that allowed the cooperative to growth as a business without loosing member control over the major strategic decisions 5. A homogeneous membership It is often claimed that within large agricultural cooperatives, particularly marketing cooperatives, heterogeneity of member interests is increasing (Cook, 1995). Growth of the cooperative beyond its original community and by diversification of main activities often results in groups of members having divergent interests. Also, members may become more diversified in their individual strategies as their farms specialize. This type of specialization is even furthered by the shift from producers of commodities bound for spot markets to producers of specialized products that are sold in dedicated supply chains. Membership heterogeneity poses a challenge for the farmer-owned cooperatives (Hansmann, 1996). Decision-making may become more laborious, coordination between members and the cooperative business may become more difficult, member commitment may decrease, and member willingness to provide equity capital may be reduced. Membership heterogeneity affects the efficiency of the cooperative organization particularly through the influence cost problem (Cook 1995). Strategic decisions often entail the (re)distribution of wealth among the members of a cooperative and thus may provoke influence attempts by members. The allocation of overhead costs, the assessment of the quality of member products, and the geographical location of a new investment are but a few examples of such decisions (Hansmann 1996). Membership homogeneity has always been high in the Netherlands. In comparison with other European countries, the Netherlands has a large number of single purpose cooperatives (Van Bekkum et al., 1997). These are cooperatives with a narrowly defined set of activities, for example the supply of feed or the processing of sugar beets. In other countries it is more common to find cooperatives that do both supplying of inputs and processing and marketing of the farm products. The combination of different tasks in so-called multipurpose cooperatives may lead to high influence costs. Other explanations for membership homogeneity are the cultural homogeneity (at least within the protestant and catholic sub-groups), the small geographical distances (allowing members to meet in person), and the low farm size distribution. 6. Pragmatism in alliances Number six of the ICA cooperative principles encourages cooperation among cooperatives. While this principle has always been applied by agricultural cooperatives in The Netherlands, it was more for practical than for ideological reasons. Working with other cooperatives instead of with other businesses was often easier because objectives were clear and similar (i.e., supporting farmer members) and directors spoke the same language. Cooperation among cooperatives used to be organized within federative structures. While new cooperatives were established as small organisations, often based in a particular community, neighbourhood, or region, they soon experienced that individually they could not gain the economies of scale or bargaining power that was needed in a competitive environment. By establishing regional cooperatives, the village cooperatives could benefit from the necessary scale, without loosing their independence. Over time, regional cooperatives formed national cooperatives which took care of tasks that can best be performed on a national scale, such as export of products, standard setting for food quality, and representing interests towards the national government. Over time, most of the federated cooperatives have disappeared in The Netherlands. Through vertical mergers, cooperatives at different scales have been integrated into single layers cooperatives. For instance, in the dairy industry local cooperatives became regional cooperatives by merging with other village cooperatives. Once reaching a certain scale, they did not need export unions anymore and started to export dairy products themselves. Another example can be found in the fresh produce industry. In 1996, with the merger of nine fresh produce auction cooperatives into one marketing cooperative (The Greenery), the federated cooperative Central Bureau of the Fruit and Vegetables Auctions (CBT) was closed. The CBT used to set rules and procedures for the member auction cooperatives and performed collective promotion of fruits and vegetables. Finally, in the feed industry, in 2000 the two major supply cooperatives – Cehave and Landbouwbelang – each transformed from a
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