A record number of 110 people qualified as professional millers last year, the millers’ guild Gilde van Molenaars said at the weekend.

Most – 95 – of the new millers will be able to operate windmills while 15 will focus on watermills.

The number of newly qualified millers shows that the craft is far from extinct, said Nicole Bakker, director of the mill preservation organisation De Hollandsche Molen. “They are much needed to keep the mills turning and milling,” she told news agency ANP.

Eelco van Norren, chairman of the millers’ guild and training institute, said he was “happy so many people who are fascinated by mills” have decided to take up milling. “Mills are living monuments and they mostly run on volunteers. We need more of them,” he said.

It takes two years to become a qualified miller. The rise in people getting their milling papers – from 100 to 110 – reflects an increase in interest in windmills, a spokesman for the guild said. “The lockdown was a contributing factor. That is when people started to rediscover windmills. There was little to do so people started to bake at home and buy flour at the mill,” he said.

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There are currently some 1,200 windmills and watermills left in the Netherlands, with around 1,600 to 1,800 millers to operate them. Most are volunteers who are helping a few dozen professional millers.

Some 100 years ago the Netherlands had 10,000 mills, processing grain, wood, oil and paper. The oldest remaining mill in the Netherlands is the Zeddam tower mill in the province of Gelderland. The craft of milling has been on Unesco intangible heritage list since 2017.