Japan and Singapore they have the most powerful passports in the world , according to him Henley Passport Index 2022 , prepared by the London consultancy Henley & Partners.
The Henley Passport Index classifies the world's passports according to the number of destinations their holders can access without a prior visa.
The ranking is based on exclusive data from the International Air Transport Association (IATA) , which maintains the world's largest and most accurate travel information database, and is enhanced by ongoing research by the Henley & Partners Research Department.
Its about fourth consecutive year that Japan occupies this position, either alone or together with Singapore. Also, Spain climbs a step with respect to last year, becoming the third most powerful passport in the world.
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THE MOST POWERFUL PASSPORTS IN THE WORLD
The latest Henley Passport Index results show Record levels of travel freedom for Japan and Singapore , countries located at the top of the ranking, but also show the largest global mobility gap recorded since the creation of the index 17 years ago.
Without taking into account temporary restrictions related to covid-19, Japan and Singapore passports open doors to 192 countries from all over the world without a visa, 166 more than Afghanistan, located at the bottom of the index.
Germany and South Korea rank second. in the ranking (gaining one position compared to 2021), with passports that can access 190 destinations without a visa
In third position , tie with 189: Finland, Italy, Luxembourg and Spain (setting one step higher than the previous year).
In fourth place we find, with 188 points: Austria and Denmark (moving up one place) and France, the Netherlands and Sweden (up two places compared to 2021).
Ireland and Portugal they occupy the fifth place (187 points) followed, in sixth place (186 points) by: Belgium, New Zealand, Norway, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States.
Completing the top 10: Australia, Canada, Czech Republic Greece and Malta (in 7th place with 185); Hungary and Poland (in 8th place with 183); Lithuania and Slovakia (in 9th place with 182); Y Estonia, Latvia and Slovenia (in 10th place with 181).
THE LEAST POWERFUL PASSPORTS
The last positions in the ranking are occupied by Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan (as in the 2021 report), whose passports allow visa-free access to 29, 28 and 26 countries respectively.
The countries of the European Union with the least powerful passport are Bulgaria and Croatia , whose inhabitants can access 173 visa-free destinations (in 2021 they could access 171 countries).
THE PANDEMIC: “A TRAVEL APARTHEID”
The passports of Japan and Singapore open the doors of 192 countries without the need for a visa. the of Afghanistan only allows to enter 26 countries.
This deepening gap in international mobility between the richest and the poorest countries was revealed at the end of last year with the arrival of the Omicron variant, which involved a series of restrictions against mainly African nations, which was described by Antonio Guterres, UN Secretary General , as a “travel apartheid”.
This, even though general levels of freedom of travel have expanded significantly over the past decade and a half. According to historical data from the Henley Passport Index, "A traveler could, on average, visit 57 countries in 2006 without needing to acquire a visa."
Today, that number has increased to 107, but, as they state in the report, “this overall increase hides a growing disparity between countries in the global north and those in the global south, with citizens of countries such as Sweden and the United States being able to visit more than 180 destinations without a visa, while passport holders from Angola, Cameroon and Laos are allowed entry to only around 50.
INEQUALITY IN GLOBAL MOBILITY
The Dr. Christian H. Kaelin , chairman of Henley & Partners and inventor of the passport index concept, states that opening migration channels is essential for post-pandemic recovery and that “passports and visas are among the most important instruments that impact on social inequality around the world, as they determine the opportunities for global mobility”.
And he continues: “The limits within which we are born and the documents we are entitled to possess they are no less arbitrary than the color of our skin. Richer states should encourage positive internal migration in an effort to help redistribute and rebalancing human and material resources around the world.
Which ones open the most doors?
THE DETERMINANTS OF PASSPORT POWER
According to exclusive research commissioned by Henley & Partners into the determinants of passport power, “richer countries' gains in travel freedom have come at the expense of poorer countries, that have experienced rising barriers to entry in recent years.
Using data from 17 years of the Henley Passport Index, political scientists Ugur Altundal and Dr. Omer Zarpli compared the scores without a visa with those World Bank statistics on GDP and fragility, as well as the data collected by the ‘Varieties of Democracy’ project (V- Dem) from the University of Gothenburg.
The study shows that citizens of upper-middle-income and high-income countries have achieved visa-free access to most nations, while “citizens of low- and lower-middle-income countries, as well as those with higher frailty scores, enjoy far less freedom to travel because they are considered high risk when it comes to safety, asylum, and overstaying.”
However, they also found that while the world's democracies on average have higher visa-free scores, "Both democratic and authoritarian regimes have increased their visa-free scores since 2006, at somewhat similar rates."
Erol Yayboke, director of the Project on Fragility and Mobility at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington, says that “research clearly shows that people in the poorest nations experience fragility, and a place to escape to is often the only option for survival.”
“The analysis similarly suggests that the geopolitical state it is an important factor influencing the power of the passport,” he adds.
These are the passports that open the most doors
2022: MORE UNCERTAINTY
The pandemic and the restrictions adopted to fight against this make up a veil of uncertainty on travel freedom by 2022.
“Omicron's presence points to a major geopolitical failure. If the United States, Great Britain and the European Union had diverted more money and vaccines to southern Africa, the chances of such a robust new strain emerging would have been much lower," he says. misha glenny, investigative journalist, author and broadcaster and associate professor at Columbia University's Harriman Institute
Until we share distribute vaccines more equitably , new mutations will have the ability to send us all back to square one,” she adds.
The Dr Andreas Brauchlin , a specialist in cardiology and internal medicine and a member of the Advisory Board of the SIP Medical Family Office in Switzerland, agrees and states that “an individual’s nationality and residency status continue to dictate access to vaccines approved nationally, while the lack of a globally recognized vaccine passport restricts mobility.”
Nick Careen , senior vice president of operations, safety and security at IATA, believes that Much of the progress made in the past two decades for passengers to control their trips through self-service processes has been undone due to pandemic-related restrictions: "Before traffic picks up again, we have a window of opportunity to deliver long-term efficiency improvements for passengers, airlines, airports and governments."
"Passports and visas are among the most important instruments that impact social inequality."
THE HENLEY PASSPORT INDEX
The tool developed by Henley & Partners allows see on a map the countries you can access with your passport without the need for a visa and those that do require a visa.
You can too compare your passport with those of other countries and even see how to improve your situation in the event that you have an additional passport.
You can check the complete classification Henley Passport Index 2021 here.