The world’s safest travel destination

With scary scenes occurring frequently around the globe, even with the best will in the world to keep calm and carry on, it can make you think twice about travelling to certain places.

I recently visited Stockholm less than a week after its infamous tragic truck attack. Typically, Stockholm is one of the safer places in the world to visit. However, according to the World Economic Forum, it’s Sweden’s Nordic neighbours who are the ones who should be at the top of your bucket list.

Despite the rising concerns across most of Europe when it comes to terrorism, Finland remains the safest destination in the world, according to the World Economic Forum’s 2017 Travel & Tourism Competitiveness Report. Investigating the ‘sustainable development of the travel and tourism sector, which in turn, contributes to the development and competitiveness of a country’, the report collects data from 136 countries to analyse and draw conclusions.

Also taking into account how open a country is to tourism in general, infrastructure, environmental sustainability and price competitiveness, not only was Finland named the safest country in the world but it also topped the list for environmental sustainability.

According to the report the top 18 safest countries in the world are:

1. Finland (6.7)
2. Iceland (6.6)
3. United Arab Emirates (6.6)
4. Hong Kong SAR (6.5)
5. Oman (6.5)
6. Singapore (6.5)
7. Norway (6.4)
8. Switzerland (6.4)
9. Rwanda (6.4)
10. Austria (6.3)
11. Luxembourg (6.3)
12. Portugal (6.3)
13. Estonia (6.3)
14. New Zealand (6.3)
15. Slovenia (6.2)
16. Sweden (6.2)
17. Spain (6.2)

And the 16 least safe countries in the world when it comes to travel are:

1. Columbia (2.6)
2. Yemen (2.8)
3. El Salvador (3.0)
4. Nigeria (3.1)
5. Pakistan (3.1)
6. Venezuela (3.3)
7. Egypt (3.3)
8. Kenya (3.4)
9. Ukraine (3.5)
10. Honduras (3.5)
11. Lebanon (3.6)
12. Philippines (3.6)
13. Mali (3.6)
14. Chad (3.7)
15. Guatemala (3.7)
16. Bangladesh (3.7)

You can read the full report at the World Economic Forum.

Do these results surprise you or would they affect your choice of travel destination? How many of these countries have you been to? And how many are on your bucket list?

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