Croatia ranks 59th among 146 countries included in the UN World Happiness Report, the Croatian Vecernji List daily reported on Monday.

The New Year is always an opportunity for individuals and countries to review the good and bad things they have left behind in the hope of a better new year, the daily reported.

Croatia is not even close to the eight happiest countries in the world in 2022 — Finland, Denmark, Iceland, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Sweden, Israel, and New Zealand. In 2021 too, it ranked only 59th among 146 countries.

Even though based on a number of parameters, such as GDP per capita, social support, healthy life expectancy at birth, generosity, perceptions of corruption, and freedom to make life choices, Croatia is not among the happiest countries in the world, we have preserved at least something that is important for happiness — close interpersonal relations and socialising over coffee in homes or in the streets, the newspaper said.

In Finland, which has been the happiest country in the world in recent years, people have great confidence in the government and show a marked sense of civic solidarity and confidence in other people.

In Croatia, there is no sense of civic solidarity because otherwise social differences would not be so great, Vecernji List said.

The Harvard Happiness Study best shows there is growing depression in the Western world because people do not have what they need the most to feel happy – good and close interpersonal relations with their friends, family and local community, Vecernji List quoted neuropsychiatrist Slavko Sakoman as saying.

In Croatia, people still love to socialise and talk over a cup of coffee and there is still family cohesion in more than 50 percent of families, Sakoman added.