Economy
See also: Mining in LimburgIn the past peat and coal were mined in Limburg. In the period 1965–1975 the coal mines were finally closed. As a result in the two coal mining areas, Heerlen-Kerkrade-Brunssum and Sittard-Geleen, 60,000 people lost their jobs. A difficult period of economic re-adjustment started. The Dutch government partly eased the pain by moving several government offices (including Stichting Pensioenfonds ABP and CBS Statistics Netherlands) to Heerlen.
The state-owned corporation that once mined in Limburg, DSM, is now a major chemical company, still operating in Limburg.
Other industries include a car factory (in Born), Océ copiers and printers manufacturers in Venlo and a paper factory in Maastricht. There are four beer breweries.
Traditionally the southern part of Limburg has been one of the two main fruit growing areas of the country. Over the last some four decades however large fruit growing areas have been replaced by water, as a result of gravel quarrying near the river Meuse.
Tourism is an essential sector of the economy especially in the hilly southern part of the province. The town of Valkenburg is the main centre.
Since about 2005, when the two provincial newspapers "De Limburger" and "Limburgs Dagblad" merged, the one left is carrying both names.
Read more about this topic: Limburg (Netherlands)
Famous quotes containing the word economy:
“Wise men read very sharply all your private history in your look and gait and behavior. The whole economy of nature is bent on expression. The tell-tale body is all tongues. Men are like Geneva watches with crystal faces which expose the whole movement.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“It enhances our sense of the grand security and serenity of nature to observe the still undisturbed economy and content of the fishes of this century, their happiness a regular fruit of the summer.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)