From 1 January, 2020 Holland would like to be referred to as the Netherlands. Officially the full name of this European country with 18 million inhabitants and Amsterdam as its capital is the Kingdom of the Netherlands. In fact, Holland is just the western, most densely populated part of the country. The other parts of the country do not feel themselves represented in the name Holland.
However, for Holland there is quite a complication, as in many languages, such as Arabic, but also in Chinese and Russian, there simply does not exist an expression for the new name, which is best to be translated as ‘the lower countries’. And indeed, the Netherlands is a country lying very low, partially even below the sea level, as a result of which the Netherlands is a world leader in protective waterworks and land reclamations.
Commenting on the name change, Ambassador of the Netherlands to Kuwait H.E. Frans Potuyt said: Changing the name of Holland in the Arab world is indeed a bit odd, and it will not work. So I do not blame anyone referring to my country as Holland. Nevertheless, the embassy team and myself will give the right example, but only when we communicate in English. Why we like to depart from the term Holland is that this ‘brand’ is often associated with windmills, cheese and flowers, and we would like to get the message across that my country represents so much more. We stand for high-tech solutions in the fields of water, food and energy. So that is why we decided to develop a new logo and change to the other name.
“The funny thing is that in the new branding, the government wanted to also skip any reference to our national symbol, the Tulip. Luckily enough there was so much resistance to the unfortunate idea, that at the end you can recognize the tulip clearly in the new logo!”
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