Belgium has the highest income tax of any OECD country; Brussels' Royal Palace is bigger than Buckingham Palace; a Belgian founded the Holy Roman Empire; French-speaking Belgium is the world's biggest producer of comics per capita; it is a Belgian who founded New York City; the first printed newspapers in the world was published in Antwerp, Belgium. What else don't you know about Belgium ? Have a look at the surprising or just informative facts below.

As of 2012, Belgium had 9 elements inscribed by UNESCO in the representative list of Intangible cultural heritage . This is to date the highest number in Europe after Spain (11) and France (10). The Intangible cultural heritage for Belgium comprise:

As of 2012, there were 11 categories of sites in Belgium on the UNESCO World Heritage List . Chronologically :

Contrarily to what is often written in English-language guide books, Belgium is not ethnically divided between North and South. Genetic studies have shown that all Belgians, Flemish or Walloon, are a blend of Gallo-Roman and Germanic (mostly Frankish ) blood. Inter-personnal differences tend to be bigger than regional ones.

Although Belgium is 321 times smaller than the USA, with 10.5 million inhabitants, it would rank as the 8th most populous US State, between Ohio and Michigan. In other words, it has the same population as the 12 states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Rhode Island, District of Columbia, Delaware, North & South Dakota, Wyoming, Montana, Idaho and Alaska combined.

Belgium is one of the most densely populated countries in the world with the population density similar to that of Japan, India, England or the neighouring Netherlands.

Languages

Belgium has 3 official languages. The North (Flanders) speaks Dutch, the South (Wallonia) speaks French, and a tiny part in the East speaks German (only 0.6% of the total population). People in Brussels, at the center of the country, speak mainly French, Dutch and English. Many Belgians are at least bilingual or trilingual as a consequence.

French is spoken in southern Belgium because Latin was the official language of the Merovingian and Carolingian courts (respectively based in Tournai and Liege), not for ethnic reasons. Note that Wallonia was never part of France, except for the brief interlude of the French Revolution (but so was most of Europe).

English, Belgium's natural lingua franca

Belgium is one of the nearest country from the UK. It takes about 2 hours by Eurostar (bullet-train) from Brussels to London, that is less than from Northern England, Scotland or Wales. Interestingly, the English language is a hybrid of Germanic languages (Anglo-Saxon and old Norse, close ancestors of Dutch) and Latin languages (Old French and Latin, direct ancestors of modern French). Nowadays, the most similar Germanic language to English is still Dutch, and many words in English have kept an (almost) identical spelling to French.

As Belgians speak both Dutch and French, English should be the easiest language to learn for speakers of either language, and even more so for those who already master the two national tongues.

Indeed, it is now increasingly common for young Dutch-speaking Flemings and French-speaking Walloons to communicate in English together, instead of trying to speak each other's language. This way, there is no hesitation about which of the two languages to use, and it prevents giving the advantage to the native speaker of the chosen language of communication.

Regional languages and dialects

Flemish is considered as a dialect of Dutch. In fact every Flemish city has its own variant, with different words and accents, but mostly intelligible to all Dutch speakers. Brussels has its own Flemish dialect, spoken mainly in the Marolles quarter (south of the Grand Place).

Wallonia is more divided linguistically. If almost everybody now speaks French (as a first or second language), the easternmost part of Wallonia (Eupen-Malmedy-St Vith area) is officially German-speaking, with Ripuarian dialects (like in Cologne) spoken around Eupen, and Moselle dialects (like in Trier) spoken in the Malmedy-St Vith region.

Walloon language, a Romance language of its own with some Germanic influence, is spoken in 70% of Wallonia, but less than a quarter of people can speak it (mostly elderly people and farmers). There are four varieties of Walloon : Liege Walloon, Namur Walloon, Picard Walloon and Lorraine Walloon.

Three dialects of northern France are spoken in Wallonia : Picard in Western Hainaut (Tournai-Mons area), Gaumais (also called Lorrain) at the southermost tip (around Arlon), and Champenois in a few villages at the border of the province of Namur and the Champagne region of France.

Economy

GDP per capita

In 1820, Belgium had the 2nd highest GDP per capita in Europe after the Netherlands (though being the same country at the time). In 1900, it had become the highest in Europe, with over twice the individual income of Italy or Norway. In 1950, after two devastating wars, Belgium had fallen in 5th position, behind Switzerland, Sweden, Denmark and the Netherlands, who had stayed neutral or suffered less from the World Wars. (sources : Nationmaster)

In 2004, Belgium had the 5th highest GDP per capita (PPP) in the EU after Luxembourg, Ireland, Denmark and Austria. Brussels has the third highest GDP per capita of any European city, after Luxembourg and central London.

Trade & Industry

According to the WTO's International Trade Statistics for 2003, Belgium is the world's 1st exporter of chocolate (in 2000) and medicaments, and the world's 4th exporter of other pharmaceuticals, sugar confectionery (in 2001-02, and 3rd in 1999), non-alcoholic beverages, eggs and cereals flour/starch, among others.

Antwerp is the world's 6th busiest port in terms of cargo tonnage (2nd outside East Asia, after Rotterdam). It is Europe's 3rd port for container traffic, after Rotterdam and Hamburg.

Belgium is also the world’s main diamond centre (in Antwerp) and second largest petrochemical center. 90% of the world's raw diamonds are negotiated and distributed in Antwerp.

Despite its small size, Belgium is the main trading partner of India along with the UK (partly because of the diamond and steel industries).

Belgium is the first foreign investors in some developing countries, like Bulgaria.

A few famous Belgian companies :

A few Belgium-based multinationals :

Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication ("SWIFT") : worldwide financial messaging network linking some 8000 financial institutions in 205 countries. Headquarted in La Hulpe, in the outskirt of Brussels

Agfa-Gevaert : Belgo-German manufacturer of photographic products.

Lu : Belgo-French manufacturer of biscuits and snacks

From the origins of the name 'Belgium' to NYC

The name "Belgium" is derived from the Latin "Belgica" or "Belgium", which was the name of the area comprising roughly Northern France and Belgium of today. American people may be more interested in this story. From 1615, Dutch colonists settled the area between Virgina and New England and named it Novum Belgium (or Novo Belgio, Nova Belgica, Novi Belgii or else Nieuwe Nederland). The reason is that "Belgium" referred in Latin to the Netherlands, and Latin names were common at the time, like for Nova Scotia (New Scotland), which remained to this day. Let us add to this story that many of the Dutch settlers who purchased the island of Manhattan from the Native Americans came from today's Belgium -- most of them from Wallonia. Peter Minuit himself was a Walloon.

Belgium's place in the world

Belgium's long neutrality in history, and its strategic location at the crossroads of Europe, earned it to be chosen as the seat of many international institutions, such as the European Union or NATO. In fact, the exact geographic centre of the EU-15 (that is, before the 2004 enlargement) was situated in Oignies-en-Thiérache, at the southern tip of the province of Namur, a few kilometers from the French border.

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