The World Happiness Report 2022, which ranks countries on the basis of a three-year average (2019-2021), has ranked Finland as the happiest country (with a score of 7.82 on the scale of 1-9, nine being the highest) in the world and Afghanistan (2.404) as the unhappiest. The results are not hard to explain. Years of war and the resulting economic ruin has left Afghanistan in tatters, while Finland is the third most prosperous nation in the world that has seen decades of peace of stability. The Middle East region also presents a contrast between the wealthy and relatively peaceful Gulf Cooperation Council countries and the strife-torn, economically weaker neighbors. TRENDS takes a look at how some of the Arab countries perform on prosperity and happiness indicators.
