Switzerland is ‘World’s Happiest’ Country

Switzerland is the world’s happiest country, according to a new survey.

The land of clocks and chocolates topped the third annual World Happiness index produced by the Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN), an initiative under the United Nations.

It was closely followed by Iceland, Denmark, Norway and Canada.

Togo, Burundi, Benin and Rwanda, with civil-war wracked Syria, were least happy.

The World Happiness Report examined 158 countries and is aimed at influencing government policy, the BBC reports.

The study bases its rankings on data from the Gallup World Poll and takes into account variables such as real Gross Domestic Product per capita, healthy life expectancy, corruption levels and social freedoms.

“Increasingly happiness is considered a proper measure of social progress and goal of public policy,” the report said.

“A rapidly increasing number of national and local governments are using happiness data and research in their search for policies that could enable people to live better lives”.

The SDSN is comprised of people from academia, government and the private sector and was first launched in 2012.


Meanwhile Nigeria placed 78th on the list ahead of neighboursGhana (114th) and Cameroon (133rd) while the United States placed 15th ahead of the United Kingdom (21st).

World’s happiest countries          World’s least happy countries
1. Switzerland                                         1. Togo
2. Iceland                                                 2. Burundi
3. Denmark                                              3. Syria
4. Norway                                                 4. Benin
5. Canada                                                 5. Rwanda