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.