The secret behind the world’s happiest country

For the seventh year running Finland has just been declared the world’s happiest country by the World Happiness Report, launched in 2012 to promote the sustainable development goals of the United Nations (UN). Those surveyed were asked to evaluate their lives on a scale of one to ten, with ten the highest. While Scandinavian countries as usual occupied the top spots, both America and Germany fell out of the top 20. War- and revolution-racked Afghanistan held the bottom spot in the ranking of 143 countries, with a score of only 1.7 compared with Finland’s 7.7 and Denmark’s 7.6.