ERBIL, Kurdistan — A major focus on the Netherlands’ diplomatic mission in Iraq and the Kurdistan Region is strengthening the economy, especially in the agriculture and water sectors, because employment and income are “key to stability, the key to peace,” Michel Rentenaar, the Dutch ambassador to Iraq, said in an interview with Rudaw’s Bestoon Khalid on Friday.
In Iraqi projects, the Netherlands has “about $17 million at the moment that we have very specifically in the agriculture sector. On top of that, we also have much in water. Everyone in the world knows that we live below the sea level, the famous story of Mr. Hans Brinker and his finger in the dyke. So we have lots and lots to offer in terms of water cooperation,” said Rentenaar,
The Netherlands, though a small country, is the second biggest agricultural exporter in the world, following the US and the ambassador said they want to transfer this success to the Kurdistan Region through exchanges between agricultural universities in the Netherlands and the Kurdistan Region and connecting farmers in both countries.
“We look through all the steps in the whole value chain, more or less from when you put the seed in the ground, whether it’s potato or tomato, it doesn’t matter, all the way to it ended up in your mouth and what needs to be done in all those steps. And, quite often, with small technical changes, small technical assistance, you can increase the production very much,” said Rentenaar.
“My best day is when I can find a Dutch agricultural company that starts working together with a Kurdish farmer and together they actually make money,” he added.
Rentenaar previously served in Iraq in 2004 as a political advisor to Dutch troops. Today, his embassy’s mission is to help the country achieve “durable stability.”
“We define our policy usually as saying, what we like to achieve or to help the Iraqis and the Kurdish people to achieve is legitimate durable stability. Not only because it’s good for you but also because it’s good for us,” he said.
They work in the areas of security, human rights, migration, “But also, and this is a crucial one, work and income, because we feel strongly that when people have jobs they will not fall back into a radicalization, they will have hope for the future,” he added.
“The reemergence of ISIS would be disastrous to this country. Obviously, a lot has been achieved in the Coalition, it went through different phases. The country, or the cities have been liberated, the caliphate has been dismantled, let’s say. But it’s too early to say that this is over. Obviously we even in Baghdad feel that very closely. A couple of weeks ago we had two suicide bombers, two bombings in the city of Baghdad. In the Nineveh Plains, very often still incidents happen. In the mountains, there are still pockets of resistance, let’s say. So all of that is very important not to drop the ball, let’s say, and not to leave too soon and to say, well this is over,” said Rentenaar.
The Netherlands has troops in Iraq and the Kurdistan Region as part of both the NATO training mission and the Global Coalition against Daesh (ISIS), including a new company of 150 Dutch soldiers recently arrived to help protect Erbil airport.
