50 Years of the Treaties of Rome

Centre: the treaty document, signed by the six founding members, set against the background of Michelangelo's star-patterned paving on the Piazza del Campidoglio in Rome, where it was signed on 25 March 1957. Directly above the document: the word "Europe" in the national language. Above: the commemorative inscription; below: the issuing state in the national language and the year 2007.

First EU joint issue. All 13 eurozone states released a coin with this design on the anniversary date, 25 March 2007. The coins differ only in the inscription, which appears in the respective national language.

In March 1957, the Netherlands was among the six states that laid the foundation for Western European integration in Rome. Together with Belgium, Luxembourg, the Federal Republic of Germany, France and Italy, Dutch representatives signed the treaties founding the European Economic Community (EEC) and the European Atomic Energy Community (Euratom) on Capitoline Hill. For the Netherlands, this step was not a reversal but a continuation: as early as 1944, Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands had agreed on the Benelux customs union while in exile in London, which took effect in 1948 and is regarded as the first concrete test of functioning economic integration in Europe. The lessons from this precursor project fed directly into the negotiations on the Treaties of Rome — the Benelux states brought already-tested concepts for shared external customs borders and coordinated trade policy to the table.

As a small, export-oriented economy with one of the world's largest seaports — Rotterdam grew into Europe's most important transshipment hub in the postwar decades — the Netherlands benefited especially strongly from the growing trade liberalisation within the Community. The EEC created the shared framework from which the European Union, and eventually the euro as a common currency, emerged via Maastricht in 1992. To mark the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Treaties of Rome, all eurozone states at the time jointly issued a 2-euro commemorative coin in 2007, including the Netherlands as one of the founding members of the European community.