My friend just sent me the following trivia question:
Of the 48 least developed countries (LDCs), 11 are islands, 10 are engaged in ongoing civil or external conflicts, 32 are African, 15 are landlocked,and 13 are in Southern Asia. Which LDC is not in any of these categories?
When you think about it, whatever country it is must be an underachiever. They’re at peace, they have a water supply and, one would assume, a place for ships to dock and they aren’t ravaged by AIDS. So does anyone know?
Dunno, but I’d guess a Latin American country.
How about Easter Island? I can’t imagine folks with big stone heads like that causing trouble.
Hmmm… how many “sovereign countries” are there? 180some? So this is the entire bottom quartile, quite a bit to choose from.
Foolishly putting aside the possibility of a Trick Question: Thing is, in the process of “handicapping” you are probably eliminating a lot of the really under-achieving nations: the ones sitting on top of a bounty of natural resources that, properly managed, could provide a bonanza for their peoples. The one remaining may after all be one that apart from a seashore and peace, has little else to go on…
Whichever one it is, quite probably it will have a couple of dozen of those other ones wishing they could trade places (due to the reasons mentioned in the OP).
We have, courtesy of the UN Council on Trade and Development, 49 countries to choose from (Senegal added this year)
http://www.unctad.org/en/pub/ps2ldc00.en.htm
Afghanistan, Angola, Bangladesh, Benin, Bhutan, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cambodia, Cape Verde, Central African Republic, Chad, Comoros, DR Congo, Djibouti, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gambia, Guinea, Guinea Bissau, Haiti, Kiribati, Laos, Lesotho, Liberia, Madagascar, Malawi, Maldives, Mali, Mauritania, Mozambique, Myanmar, Nepal, Niger, Rwanda, Samoa, Sao Tome & Principe, Senegal*, Sierra Leone, Solomon Islands, Somalia, Sudan, Togo, Tuvalu, Uganda, Tanzania, Vanuatu, Yemen, Zambia
**1. 11 are islands
10 are engaged in ongoing civil or external conflicts
32 are African
15 are landlocked
13 are in Southern Asia**
Designating “Southern” Asia in point 5 seems suspicious. Some other part of Asia, perhaps? But the only non-landlocked Northern Asian nation-states I see are Russia (who should be considered to be in an ongoing conflict–Chechnya), Ukraine, and Georgia.
I doubt anyone in the Middle East makes the list of least-developed.
Ditto with Europe. I’m not sure how they’re defining “least-developed,” but I’d guess that since most of Europe has been built and rebuilt over the last 10,000 years, they don’t qualify.
North America: As long as they’re not counting Native American tribes, we’re out of the game.
So Latin America would seem to be it. I’m afraid I don’t know enough about the various military conflicts there to narrow it down, though.
The list of Least Developed Countries was recently updated to include Senegal, giving a total of 49 LDC’s. We can easily eliminate African, landlocked and island countries. Southern Asia is a bit more ambiguous, but I assume this doesn’t include Southeast Asia. This leaves us with four countries:
[ul]
[li]Cambodia[/li][li]Haiti[/li][li]Mynamar (Burma)[/li][li]Yemen[/li][/ul]
These are all rather troubled spots, though. Cambodia still has some problems with the Khmer Rouge and others. The military junta is still in power in Myanmar. Haiti and Yemen have been quiet recently.
SNec, if you don’t mind me asking. Who asked you this question and why?
mongrel_8
One of my friends has this thing at work where every week they ask a different trivia question. She forwarded this particular one on to me and some other friends.
By the way, based on Terminus Est’s excellent analysis, I guess it has to be Yemen, since Haiti, while not taking up a whole island, is on an island.
Well let me add an observation or two.
One suspects they mean South East Asia.
You would doubt wrong. Yemen does. Sudan might depending on how you define Middle East. Not all the Middle East is Oil Sheikhdoms, in fact they are the minority on ever measure, area, population etc.
Your comments imply that Europe has been ahead of the rest of the world for 10K years. That is false. Much of what we call Europe was a backwater until roughly 500 or so years ago and certainly was not more advanced than the rest of the world on average until the 18th century or so. See Jared Diamond.
However, in re Yemen, depending on what your friends mean by “they have a water supply” this is a bit specious. Yemen faces currently severe problems.
For Terminus Est’s analysis, I would disagree that Southern Asia would not be South East Asia, but we definately need to define the terms.
Collounsbury,
Actually, the last paragraph of the OP is my own thoughts on the question, so the “water supply” remark was my own addition and is actually irrelevant to the true answer.
Either they’re working with a different list of LDC’s or the definition of Southern Asia is wrong. I can see only eight Asian countries (regardless of whether they are “Southern”): Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Nepal, and Yemen. If you count the Maldives as being in Asia, you get nine. To get thirteen “Southern Asian” countries, you’ll have to throw in Samoa, the Solomon Islands, Togo, and Tuvalu. But that just doesn’t make sense to me.
You’re right I only count nine too. The Maldives is considered part of Asia.
Regarding your stretch list;
Togo is on the African continent.
Solomon Islands could be borderline, I’ve seen them referred to as part of Asia occasionally, but most often they are part of Oceania as is Samoa, Tuvalu and Kiribati.
Also, I count 34 African countries:
Angola, Benin, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cape Verde, Central African Republic, Chad, Comoros, DR Congo, Djibouti, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gambia, Guinea, Guinea Bissau, Lesotho, Liberia, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mauritania, Mozambique, Niger, Rwanda, Sao Tome & Principe, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Somalia, Sudan, Togo, Uganda, Tanzania, Zambia
Even without the addition of Senegal, it’s still one more than stated in the OP Trivia question. Must be flawed.
Damn! I must have been thinking of Tonga. And Kiribati is indeed part of Oceania [sub]and I even counted it in my original list[/sub].
Note to self: drink more coffee.