The Dutch have a saying: “God created the
world, but the Dutch created the Netherlands”. Today we will see why. The Dutch polders are the largest land reclamation
projects in the world, a true marvel of engineering which added nearly 20% of land to the country,
and its fertile land makes the Netherlands the second largest exporter of food in the
world. In the last episode we looked at how a large
dike was constructed to block seawater from flooding the inner regions of the netherlands. In this episode we’re going to look at how
parts of this inland water area was drained and turned into fertile land. While this is part of a series, you don’t
need to have watched the first episode to understand this one. I try to make my videos as stand-alone as
I can. Ever since the 16th century, large areas of
land have been reclaimed from the sea and lakes, amounting to over 50% of the country’s
current land area if you include every lake ever laid dry. The process of land reclamation in the Netherlands
is mainly done through Poldering. It is the process of draining water from a
lake or by placing dikes around an area of water and THEN draining it until you are left
with very fertile land. And this is what Lely proposed: build a dike
to stop the sea water, then build smaller dikes inside this newly formed lake, and one-by-one
drain the water. This land was rich in clay, could be settled,
and could be farmed, which in turn meant that the Dutch government could tax them, and make
A LOT of money. To test poldering the Southern Sea itself,
they decided to first make a small test polder, only 400 square meters. It took about a year and it tested the effects
drainage would have on the soil of the Southern Sea and how best to configure the new polders. They first built an 18 km dike around the
area and then proceeded to pump it dry. This was performed by a using a variation
on the Archimedes’ screw in a pumping station or a mill. To make the land suitable for agriculture,
a network of ditches were dug in the polder to channel water towards the pumping stations. The resulting dehydration caused the seabed
to sink by over a meter in some places. Once the ground was settled, the ditches were
replaced with underground drainage tubes. And while the polder was now dry, it couldn’t
be settled yet: the ground was still far too unstable. So they then cultivated the land by throwing
reed seeds out of airplanes. This sturdy plant helped evaporate the water
and bring air into the soil, thereby solidifying the land. Then, basic infrastructure was built such
as roads and the fields of reed were burned and replaced with rapeseed. When winter turned into spring, the newborn
polder would slowly turn into a sea of yellow. These yellow plants were then replaced with
various grains such as rye, wheat, barley, and oats. This process took years, but in the end the
soil was rich enough to allow the planting of other crops while roads and housing were
being built for the future settlers and farmers. The later polders were divided into plots
of about 50 acres (20 ha). The best land is used for vegetables; the
next best for rye and other grain; and the worst land is forested. Each plot has a paved road in the front and
a canal in the back to make it accessible by land and water. While this test polder was being built, the
engineers didn’t simply wait and see. They decided to continue with poldering other
parts of the IJsselmeer and would know if there was any trouble ahead by looking at
the Pilot Polder’s progress. They started with the Wieringermeer. This area that would eventually encompass
this polder already included several villages, this presented a new problem for the Dutch
government: who did this new land belong to? the Southern Sea was divided among the mainland
municipalities. This is okay for water area, but now that
it was going to be land, splitting up the responsibility among several government bodies. So it was decided that this land would be
a “public body”, which meant there was a complicated arrangement where a government
body was in charge of working on the polder and was committee responsible for public governance. As the polder became more populated, its people
demanded representation in politics and so it became its own municipality on july 1st,
1941. The next project is the Noordoostpolder, or
North East Polder. Here too, they first built dikes around the
area they wanted to lay dry and then pump out all the water, cultivate with simple seeds
to strengthen the ground, then continue with different plants until you can build roads
and farms and eventually being cultivating the land. There were two major events related to this
polder, however. The first is that much of its construction
occurred under German occupation. At first they let the work continue unhindered
as they wanted to create a polder inside Germany. But as the war turned for the worse, raids
for people in hiding occured, workers were deported, and before losing the war they blew
up parts of the dikes and partially flooding the land. Luckily this damage was repaired quickly and
the water drained within a few weeks. The second major occurrence was something
unexpected. You see, this polder is connected to the land. But the polder is located a few meters lower
than the mainland and so, water in the soil would slowly drain into the polder. Then that water was pumped into the Southern
Sea. This made the land close to the polder deprived
of water and less fertile. So for the next polder they decided to leave
strings of lakes surrounded the new Polder, called Flevoland. Flevoland was named after the Roman name for
an ancient lake in that area, it roughly means ‘Land of the stream’. But because the polder would be surrounded
by water, they needed a much longer dike, a 90 kilometer long dike was constructed for
the eastern section of Flevoland. Work began in 1951 but two years later, in
1953, a massive flood hit the south of the Netherlands, a region unprotected from modern
dikes such as the Afsluitdijk. This was the largest natural disaster to strike
the netherlands in its entire history. This event created tens of thousands of refugees
and construction on Flevoland halted until they could get the south up and running again. And these refugees needed a place to stay. Many of them were farmers and many were given
plots of land in the new polders, along with carefully selected farmers from elsewhere
in the netherlands. And when the south was finally safe again,
many opted to stay in the new polders. But Flevoland wasn’t ready yet. Work on this polder finished in 1957 and it
was decided to build a city which could function as the regional commercial and managerial
capital for Flevoland and the North Eastern Polder. This city would be called Lelystad, after
the man who 70 years prior laid out the plans to build this prestigious project. In 1959 the Southern Flevoland Polder began
construction and finished in 1968, taking longer because they only used a single pump
to drain an area of 430 KM2. Due to its proximity to Amsterdam and the
Amsterdam Housing Shortage at the time, Flevoland would get a second city to relieve tension
from the capital. Thanks to motorized farming equipment and
artificial fertilizer, farmland had become a lot less valuable by that time. So much of Flevoland was turned into housing
and nature preserves Construction on Flevoland officially finished
in 1984, when the crucial urban areas were finished. Four years later, the polders would become
their own province rather than being split up between the existing one, adding the twelfth
province of Flevoland to The Netherlands. And the last polder was the Markerwaard. A dike was constructed to prevent minor floods
in the Amsterdam region, but construction was slow, lasting 12 years, twice as long
as the Afsluitdijk. The debate whether to build the last polder
dragged on for years: with modern technology the need for agricultural land had disappeared. The extra space for housing was no longer
needed thanks to the Southern Flevoland polder, and by this time people took ecological concerns
a lot more serious. So it was decided to leave it as it was to
preserve nature and for recreational use. In 2012 plans were approved to build several
small islands here but it would only be accessible to tourists and birdwatchers. This project was the largest land reclamation
project in history and ended only a few years before I was born. It is the dream of one man who, through his
engineering genius and political cunning, was able to save thousands of lives and propel
the netherlands as a country famous for hydro engineering.
