For a State, having an outlet to the sea or the Ocean is a fundamental advantage: maritime routes, in fact, first of all allow greater development of trade – especially from an international point of view – but they also guarantee access to a series of strategic resources, such as fish (obtained from fishing).
In the list of landlocked states – 44 in total – 2 countries are doubly penalized: not only do they not overlook the sea, but they only border other states which, in turn, do not have maritime access.
Can you guess what they are?
A little help: one of these states is located in Europe, not too far from Italy…
ATTENTION! From this moment on the solutions to the quiz will be visible.
1. Liechtenstein
Liechtenstein, or rather the Principality of Liechtenstein, is the first solution of this quiz. It is a central European state enclosed between Austria and Switzerland, two countries which in turn do not have an outlet to the sea. With its 160 km2 of surface area, it is one of the smallest states in the world and has a total of approximately 41,000 inhabitants.
Despite not overlooking the sea – and therefore not having access to some important natural resources -, Liechtenstein is a particularly rich country, with more registered companies than actually resident citizens: over the years, in fact, its economy has managed to grow thanks to favorable tax policies for businesses, especially those active in the finance and technology sectors.
The country is not part of the European Union, but is a member of the European Economic Area (EEA), which groups together the 27 EU states together with Iceland and Norway (as well as Lichtenstein himself). Its official currency is the Swiss franc and the capital is Vaduz.
2. Uzbekistan
Uzbekistan is the second “doubly” landlocked country: it is located in Asia and borders Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan. In reality, as also visible on the map below, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan overlook the Caspian Sea. At this point you might wonder why Uzbekistan is on this list: this is because, despite its name, the Caspian Sea is not really a sea, but rather a salt lake. It is called a sea as it has an extension, depth and salinity greater than that of a lake, but it is closed and therefore cannot properly be considered a sea.
Compared to Liechtenstein, it is a country of considerable size: it extends for approximately 450,000 km2 and has 37.5 million inhabitants. Its economy is still based heavily on agriculture: not surprisingly, it is one of the world’s leading producers of cotton. At the same time, it produces and exports a large volume of natural gas.
It has been independent from the Soviet Union since 1991 and its capital is Tashkent.
