"Do the Netherlands have a cold climate?"

[CJ.Dennis]

I got this as a multiple choice question, so I couldn't try it myself, but since the Netherlands is a country (not are a country), shouldn't it be "Does the Netherlands have a cold climate"?

[feyMorgaina]

I agree with you.

It's the same as for the United States or the United Kingdom - the conjugation is singular, not plural.

Some links:

https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/48072/how-to-treat-a-country-name-that-has-a-plural-meaning

https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/189936/the-netherlands-are-vs-the-netherlands-is

[Dutchesse722]

Well, it's called the Netherlands because it's really a kingdom that includes not only Nederland but also the Netherlands Antilles and Aruba and formerly Suriname and Indonesia. In Dutch it's formally called het Koningrijk der Nederlanden, but generally when people refer to the Netherlands they really just mean that small country in western Europe bordering Germany and Belgium.

[Multitaal]

I would say Netherlands is plural but dictionary.com says both singular and plural verb conjugation are allowed.

[Bob335785]

Both in Dutch and English the words: 'the Netherlands' and 'Nederland' are considered as singular nouns. :)