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There has always been a wide global mobility gap between the global north and the global south, with some passport holders granted more access to countries than others.

Of course, the COVID-19 pandemic has just made things even more extreme for travel freedom, widening the gap more than ever before.

Yup, you saw that one coming, didn’t you?

Since 2006, London-based global citizenship and residence advisory firm Henley & Partners has been regularly monitoring the world’s most travel-friendly passports.

The firm’s Henley Passport Index is released in a yearly report, revealing the most powerful passports of the time.

For 2022, the index didn’t take the temporary travel restrictions into account but did acknowledge how the discovery of various COVID-19 variants (we’re looking at you, Omicron) revealed the growing divide in international mobility between wealthier countries and poorer ones.

Here’s Dr Christian Kaelin, chairman of Henley & Partners, via CNN:

“The borders within which we happen to be born, and the documents we are entitled to hold, are no less arbitrary than our skin color. Wealthier states need to encourage positive inward migration in an effort to help redistribute and rebalance human and material resources worldwide.”

Moving on to the best-ranked passports in 2022, based on how many countries the passport holder can travel to visa-free:

1. Japan, Singapore (192 destinations)
2. Germany, South Korea (190)
3. Finland, Italy, Luxembourg, Spain (189)
4. Austria, Denmark, France, Netherlands, Sweden (188)
5. Ireland, Portugal (187)
6. Belgium, New Zealand, Norway, Switzerland, United Kingdom, United States (186)
7. Australia, Canada, Czech Republic, Greece, Malta (185)
8. Poland, Hungary (183)
9. Lithuania, Slovakia (182)
10. Estonia, Latvia, Slovenia (181)

And the worst passports to have, in descending order, are:

104. North Korea (39 destinations)
105. Nepal and Palestinian territories (37)
106. Somalia (34)
107. Yemen (33)
108. Pakistan (31)
109. Syria (29)
110. Iraq (28)
111. Afghanistan (26)

None of that comes as much of a surprise, does it?

South Africa doesn’t rank too badly, outside of the current situation of being locked out of several countries (South Africa has 93 ‘major restrictions’ in place from other countries as of January 11) due to fears around the Omicron variant.

BusinessTech has more:

The index shows that South Africa has gained three places in the rankings, moving up to 51st position. At the start of 2022, South African passport holders are able to access 104 destinations without obtaining a prior visa.

You can see a full list of those 104 countries here.

[sources:cnn&businesstech]