Water is recognized as being an important factor in numerous pheno mena connected with the quality of food. For instance, it plays a part in the textural properties of several commodities. Moreover, water is an essential parameter determining the behaviour of food products in the course of many processing operations: on water, will depend the amount of energy necessary for freezing or dehydrating the product; water will strongly influence the evolution of physical, chemical and biochemical phenomena taking place in the product during processing operations such as heating, drying, etc. Water...

On 1 May 1967 Dr. J elle Zijlstra was appointed President of De Nederlandsche Bank, after an already eventful career. Following a brief spell as Professor of Economics at the Free University of Amsterdam, he began a lengthy period of ministerial service in 1952. During his cabinet years, he devised a concept which became known in the Netherlands as the' Zijl- stra norm', and which was aImed at keeping the Government's financial deficit in check. He concluded his active political career .as prime minister in 1966-1967. Dr. Zijlstra's career as a politician and central banker covered a period...

Since Malthus and the days of the long-term conceptions ofthe other classical econ omists - an era characterized so poignantly by W.]. Baumol as the magnificent dynamics - demography has not featured prominently in economics. Although admittedly post-war growth theories have always included the growth ofthe volume of labour as an exogenous variable in their considerations, this did not receive the explicit attention of economists. Analyses of the capital market tended even less to draw attention to or inspire interest in the demographic element, despite the fact that the savings behaviour...

For the Netherlands, commercial and cultural contacts across the borders are of vital importance. The world's eighth trading nation holding pride of place in many market segments, the Netherlands is highly dependent on developments worldwide. Through other economic ties as well, our country is firmly embedded in the world around us. Until the Second World War, the methods used in the Netherlands to collect data about these international relations were less than adequate. As a result, the compila tion of a consistent overview in the form of a balance of payments was barely feasible in those...