[OC] The Roughest Countries in the World (How does the size of a country change, if you consider all the hills and mountains)
Posted by 321159
[OC] The Roughest Countries in the World (How does the size of a country change, if you consider all the hills and mountains)
Posted by 321159
4 comments
This was computed using Google Earth Engine and the Global Digital Elevation Model by Copernicus with a 30m resolution. You have to pick a resolution and stick with it, otherwise you run into the [coastline paradox](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coastline_paradox). Visualization was done with plotnine in Python.
Anyway, here’s the leaderboards for flattest and hilliest countries:
#### Flat
| Country | Planar Area (km²) | Surface Area (km²) | Percent increase |
|:————–|:——————–|:———————|:——————-|
| Kuwait | 17,364 | 17,368 | 0.02% |
| Botswana | 578,160 | 578,338 | 0.03% |
| Qatar | 11,653 | 11,657 | 0.04% |
| Tuvalu | 29 | 29 | 0.05% |
| Kiribati | 925 | 925 | 0.05% |
| Bahamas, The | 12,454 | 12,461 | 0.05% |
| Maldives | 161 | 161 | 0.05% |
| Senegal | 196,296 | 196,431 | 0.07% |
| Burkina Faso | 273,354 | 273,554 | 0.07% |
| Marshall Is | 128 | 128 | 0.07% |
| Gambia, The | 10,717 | 10,727 | 0.09% |
| Bahrain | 779 | 779 | 0.09% |
| Mauritania | 1,037,609 | 1,038,734 | 0.11% |
| Mali | 1,255,034 | 1,256,461 | 0.11% |
| Paraguay | 399,439 | 399,939 | 0.13% |
| Benin | 115,292 | 115,463 | 0.15% |
| South Sudan | 642,458 | 643,678 | 0.19% |
| Niger | 1,180,868 | 1,183,114 | 0.19% |
| Guinea-Bissau | 33,657 | 33,729 | 0.21% |
| Netherlands | 36,191 | 36,274 | 0.23% |
#### Hilly
| Country | Planar Area (km²) | Surface Area (km²) | Percent increase |
|:—————————-|:——————–|:———————|:——————-|
| Bhutan | 38,585 | 45,685 | 18.40% |
| Nepal | 147,578 | 170,573 | 15.58% |
| Andorra | 464 | 535 | 15.29% |
| Liechtenstein | 160 | 182 | 13.94% |
| Tajikistan | 141,299 | 160,619 | 13.67% |
| Taiwan | 36,325 | 40,671 | 11.96% |
| Georgia | 45,627 | 50,916 | 11.59% |
| Switzerland | 41,287 | 45,971 | 11.34% |
| Kyrgyzstan | 198,324 | 220,303 | 11.08% |
| Dominica | 762 | 840 | 10.22% |
| Austria | 83,937 | 91,179 | 8.63% |
| Albania | 28,679 | 30,965 | 7.97% |
| Sao Tome & Principe | 990 | 1,068 | 7.93% |
| Korea, North | 122,012 | 131,665 | 7.91% |
| New Zealand | 269,483 | 290,744 | 7.89% |
| St Vincent & the Grenadines | 386 | 417 | 7.88% |
| Japan | 376,486 | 405,077 | 7.59% |
| Laos | 229,746 | 247,129 | 7.57% |
| Montenegro | 13,905 | 14,896 | 7.13% |
| Korea, South | 98,801 | 105,577 | 6.86% |
Of the top 10 tallest mountains in the world, 8 are in Nepal.
Australia is so flat, that even the Polynesians couldn’t land and colonize the continent because they couldn’t see Australian mountains from their sailing canoes.
On a similar note: during my exchange in Colombia our logistics and supply chain prof said that Colombia has the second most “hostile” landscape for building road infrastructure (mostly due to mountains), right after Afghanistan. Source credibility with some doubt
Comments are closed.