"Groningen, the upper best" Top 5 Page for this destination Provincie Groningen by tompt

This page will be built in the near future. With sights and places of the entire province.

Now it only has pictures of Groningen city as we couldn´t place them all on our Groningen city page.

Want to know more about Groningen province?
tourist info: http://www.vvvgroningen.nl
provincie Groningen:http://www.provinciegroningen.nl/
some pics in our travelogue at our Netherlands page.

map of Groningen province around 1775

The Province of Groningen shares its name with the province's capital. The original name, 'villa Cruoninga', was given in 1040 to a neighbourhood on the place of the present city. In the 13th century Groningen became a strong trading city, which had an administration with legal rules. The city was protected by a wall. This city made treaties with the surrounding areas to safeguard its central position for trade. These surrounding areas were often called the "Ommelanden'' . The city brought the higher level of the administration of justice for the city and the Ommelanden within its city walls.
This became the later provincial court of appeal. The city and the Ommelanden were in constant fights. The city made the law that all goods produced in the city and Ommelanden, such as grain and beer, had first to be traded in the
city. The surrounding areas were furious. And from there a system of consultation between the rulers
in the city and in the Ommelanden was made.

In 1594, during the eighty years' war between Catholic Spain and the Calvinist rebels in the
Netherlands, Groningen city and the Ommelanden were forced to join the Republic of the United
Netherlands as a seventh province. A group of people ruled the new province, they were called the
States and they met once or a few times a year. The day-to-day administration of the Province of
Groningen was delegated to eight deputies. The stadholder, the representative of the central
government of the Republic, was the highest official and chairman of the day-to-day administration.

During the French occupation the provincial governments were subordinated to the central authority
in The Hague. Municipalities, 62 in number, were set up throughout the area. And in 1814 Groningen
Province was created. The provincial government consisted of a Provincial Executive (the
executive body), and the Provincial Council (the general administrative body). The King's
Commissioner, who until 1850 was called the governor, was the chairman of both of these.
The Provincial Council consisted of 36 members. From 1825 onwards the Provincial Executive
consisted of 5 members.

The new Provinces Act of 1850 gave the province responsibility of its own. The province was allowed
to draw up its own budget , its own taxes and its own ordinances. From then the Provincial Council
was elected directly by the citizens. The number of members of the Provincial Council grew to the
present figure of 55. In 1850 the number of members of the Provincial Executive was fixed at 6.

Source: Groningen Provincial Almanac 1996-1998 M. Schroor.

Polder Tussenklappen near Zuidbroek

Groningen province is 2.967 km², of which 623 km² is water.
Number of inhabitants:
565,758 of whom 175,666 in Groningen city. (2001).
Employed: 262,007 - Unemployed:26,186

Major industries:
- Extraction and distribution of natural gas
- starch/starch derivatives
- sugar
- paper and board/paper and board products
- basic chemicals - basic metals
- shipbuilding

Picture is showing a natural gas plant in the Tussenklappen Polder near Zuidbroek. A few years
ago we had a very wet period and the polder was used to store water, so the cities would not get a
problem with the water. The gasplant is still working today.