Dutch Gas Boom Bypasses People Who Live Closest to Its Source - by Fred Pals
Marga Robbes, a mother of four, stands in a food line each month in Groningen, the poorest province in the Netherlands. Beneath her feet lies Europe's biggest deposit of natural gas, the largest source of the country's wealth. Groningen sits atop the Slochteren field, which has generated about half of the 162 billion euros in gas proceeds the Netherlands has received since its discovery in 1959. Only 1 percent of projects funded by gas revenue from 1994 through 2004 went to Groningen and neighboring Friesland and Drenthe provinces, according to a study by the Leiden, Netherlands-based consulting firm IOO.
``Groningen province has been systematically ignored when it comes to the handing out of projects,'' said Jan Oosterhaven, a professor of urban planning at the University of Groningen. In its 2007 budget, the government pledged 1.9 billion euros from gas revenue to 43 projects. Only three are in Groningen. Most of the rest will go to the densely populated west, home to the country's four largest cities -- Amsterdam, Rotterdam, The Hague and Utrecht. Groningen has fewer than 600,000 residents, or 4 percent of the nation's 16 million people.
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