In the bleakest scenario for humanity, if global civilization collapses, for whatever reason, survival could depend on three strong factors.
A region needs a mild island climate to remain suitable for agriculture even as the planet destabilizes. It needs an electrical grid that operates without imported fuels. And it needs enough farmland to feed its population when global trade grinds to a halt.
A peer-reviewed study, published in the journal Sustainability, applied these criteria to every country on Earth.
The researchers, Nick King and Aled Jones of the Global Sustainability Institute at Anglia Ruskin University, were examining which areas of the planet could maintain some degree of organized society while the rest of the world was collapsing.
A second analysis, published in February 2023 in Risk Analysis and reprinted by the Guardian, considered a more limited threat: a sudden catastrophe that blocks sunlight, such as a nuclear winter, the eruption of a supervolcano, or the impact of an asteroid.
This study compared 38 island countries based on 13 survival factors. Together, these two studies pinpointed seven countries with the best odds.
The Sustainability Team applied all three criteria, and New Zealand passed by a wide margin. Its hydroelectric dams and geothermal fields could support a national grid without a single tanker arriving at port. The country has about 0.023 square kilometers of farmland per person, a reserve that few developed countries can match. Its location in the South Pacific also provides natural protection from disruptions that would have ripple effects across interconnected continents.
Iceland came in second, by a narrow margin. The country is powered by geothermal and hydroelectric power, giving it almost complete energy independence. The small population, spread across a volcanic peninsula with a significant amount of arable land, means that pressure on local resources remains low, even if outside help never arrives.
Ireland was included in the list of candidates thanks to its mild climate and high percentage of agricultural land. However, the researchers noted that its renewable energy infrastructure does not yet reach the level of autonomy of the first two candidates.
The United Kingdom is a more precarious case. The British Isles have the same oceanic climate that protects the other countries on the list.
But the UK’s population density strains the country’s carrying capacity in ways that less densely populated islands simply don’t. The country is also heavily dependent on imported components for its electricity grids and food production systems, vulnerabilities that would be immediately apparent if global trade collapsed.
Australia occupies a strange middle ground. The authors dismiss most of the continent as too dry and too hot to support a complex society without large energy sources for cooling and irrigation. Instead, they single out Tasmania, whose climate and resource profile more closely mirror that of New Zealand.
The Risk Analysis study added two names to the list. 6 – Solomon Islands and 7 – Vanuatu as countries capable of producing enough food for their populations after a sharp global cooling event. Neither nation has the industrial base of the developed countries on the list, but both maintain agricultural systems that could function without the complex supply chains that feed modern megacities.
The authors of the Risk Analysis ranked Australia first in the nuclear winter scenario. The logic changes completely under dark-sky conditions. While the Sustainability study sees the continent’s interior as a disadvantage as temperatures gradually rise, the Risk Analysis sees the same large land mass as a strategic reserve as temperatures drop sharply and radioactive waste accumulates across the Northern Hemisphere. “Australia’s food supply is extraordinary,” the study concludes, “with the potential to feed tens of millions more people.”
