Dirk Strijker, Faculty of Spatial Sciences
Groningen University, Groningen, The Netherlands
The Geography of a Cooperative Starch Company (assigned to theme
AVEBE is a leading potato starch and starch derivatives producing and marketing cooperative, based in the Netherlands. The firm has developed from a selling bureau, owned by local cooperatives, to a multinational firm, owned directly by farmers, with operations in 20 countries. In this paper the international aspects of the firm are analysed, embedded in the fundamental tension between the interest of the members as suppliers, and the members as owners. The choice for specific locations is analysed. In the paper the historical line is followed. We start in 1840 with the ‘global’ aspects of the founding parties (cooperatives and private firms, in particular the W.A. Scholten-firm). It will be argued that the interest of the members did not stimulate the process of internationalisation of the firm.
submitted 2005-05-02 11:52:54.817
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