Chairman of the Trustees

Gerrit Zalm is a former Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance of the Netherlands. Having served under four governments from 1994 to 2007, he is the longest serving Minister of Finance in the history of his country.

Beginning in 1975 and before becoming Minister of Finance in 1994, Mr Zalm held a number of high level positions in the Dutch Ministry of Finance and Ministry of Economic Affairs.

In 1981 he was appointed the Deputy Director for Budgetary Affairs and Head of the Budget Preparation Division.

In 1983 Mr Zalm was appointed Deputy Director for General Economic Policy at the Ministry for Economic Affairs, becoming head of that directorate in 1985.

He then joined the Central Planning Bureau in 1988, first as a Deputy Managing Director and from 1989 as Managing Director. He also served as part-time Professor in Economics at Amsterdam Free University (discipline Economic Policy) from 1990.

Since leaving the Dutch Government in February 2007, Mr Zalm has taken a number of advisory positions for private organisations. He is currently Chief Economist for DSB Bank; a consultant to PricewaterhouseCoopers in the Netherlands;  an adviser to Permira, a private equity fund and Chairman of the Advisory Council of We go 4 it, a co‑operative effort among the social assistance organisations of the four largest cities of the Netherlands.