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Azerbaijan Ranks Among World’s Happiest Nations

By Nargiz Mammadli December 30, 2021

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A couple taking selfie at the Highland Park in Azerbaijan's capital Baku / Courtesy

Azerbaijan scored high points in the categories of hope, happiness and economic expectations on the annual global “End of Year” survey conducted by Gallup International.

Gallup International (GIA), a Swiss-based association of polling organizations, measured how often people in different regions and countries feel happy and hopeful, and what are their economic welfare expectations from the upcoming year.

People in Indonesia were revealed to be the most hopeful as 76 percent of the country’s population expect 2022 to be better than 2021. Albania (70%), Nigeria (68%), Azerbaijan (62%), and Vietnam (59%) followed Indonesia in the Top 5 of the most hopeful nations chart. In the meantime, people in Afghanistan (56%), Turkey (56%), Bulgaria (48%), Poland (47%), the Czech Republic (45%), and Pakistan (41%) are not hoping for better developments in 2022 and think the next year will be worse than 2021.

Azerbaijan was featured in the Top 5 happy countries of the world, as well. The country scored +70 points in the Happiness Index of GIA, making the list of the five happiest nations alongside Colombia (+79), Kazakhstan (+76), Albania (+74), and Malaysia (+73). Happiness seems to be rarely experienced among the people of Ghana (+2 only), Afghanistan (+9), Hong Kong (+11), Iraq (17), and Russia (+18).

Meanwhile, 52 percent of Azerbaijan’s population of over ten million are optimistic about economic prosperity in 2022. GIA’s Economic Expectations data acknowledged Azerbaijan as one of the world’s top 6 most optimistic nations who expect the economy to further grow in the upcoming year in comparison to the outgoing year. In addition to Azerbaijan, people in Nigeria (61%), Indonesia (58%), Vietnam (56%), Albania, and India (both 49%) are also convinced to take advantage of a better economy in 2022.

According to data compiled by the Asian Development Bank, Azerbaijan’s economy will continue growing in 2022 despite global economic hardships brought mainly by the pandemic. The GDP of the country is expected to grow 2.5 percent in 2022.

In the meantime, lower expectations for economic prosperity next year are registered in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Turkey, where 72 percent of people are pessimistic about the growth of the national economy. The two countries are followed by Bulgaria (64%), Poland (64%), Romania (61%), Afghanistan (60%), and Germany (59%).