A landlocked country is a country that does not have any territory connected to an ocean or whose coastlines lie solely on endorheic basins. Currently, there are 44 landlocked countries, two of them doubly landlocked (Liechtenstein and Uzbekistan), and three landlocked de facto states in the world. Kazakhstan is the world's largest landlocked country, Kyrgyzstan is the furthest landlocked country from any ocean, while Ethiopia is the world's most populous landlocked country.[1][2]
Generally, being landlocked creates political and economic disadvantages that having access to international waters would avoid. For this reason, nations large and small throughout history have fought to gain access to open waters, even at great expense in wealth, bloodshed, and political capital.
The economic disadvantages of being landlocked can be alleviated or aggravated depending on degree of development, surrounding trade routes and freedom of trade, commonality of language, and other considerations. Some landlocked countries in Europe are affluent, such as Andorra, Austria, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, San Marino, Switzerland, and Vatican City, all of which, excluding Luxembourg (a founding member of NATO), frequently employ neutrality in global political issues.
On 19 September 2023, Azerbaijan launched a new offensive against the Republic of Artsakh (de facto state) and achieved a decisive victory.[8] The Government of Artsakh was officially dissolved on 1 January 2024. As a result, Artsakh ceased to exist as a landlocked de facto state and the Nagorno-Karabakh region was reintegrated into Azerbaijan.[9]
Historically, being landlocked has been disadvantageous to a country's development. It cuts a nation off from important sea resources such as fishing, and impedes or prevents direct access to maritime trade, a crucial component of economic and social advance. As such, coastal regions, or inland regions that have access to the World Ocean, tended to be wealthier and more heavily populated than inland regions that have no access to the World Ocean. Paul Collier in his book The Bottom Billion argues that being landlocked in a poor geographical neighbourhood is one of four major development "traps" by which a country can be held back. In general, he found that when a neighbouring country experiences better growth, it tends to spill over into favorable development for the country itself. For landlocked countries, the effect is particularly strong, as they are limited in their trading activity with the rest of the world. He states, "If you are coastal, you serve the world; if you are landlocked, you serve your neighbors."[10] Others have argued that being landlocked has an advantage as it creates a "natural tariff barrier" that protects the country from cheap imports. In some instances, this has led to more robust local food systems.[11][12]
Landlocked developing countries have significantly higher costs of international cargo transportation compared to coastal developing countries (in Asia the ratio is 3:1).[13]
Historically, traveling between a landlocked country and a country which did not border said country required the traveler to pass border controls twice or more. In recent times the advent of air travel has largely negated this impediment.
Actions to avoid being landlocked
Countries have acted to overcome being landlocked by acquiring land that reaches the sea:
The Republic of Ragusa, in 1699, gave the town of Neum to the Ottoman Empire because it did not want to have a land border with the Republic of Venice.[14] This small municipality was inherited by Bosnia and Herzegovina and now provides limited sea access, splitting the Croatian part of the Adriatic coast in two. Since Bosnia and Herzegovina is a new country, railways and ports have not been built for its need. There is no freight port along its short coastline at Neum, making it effectively landlocked, although there are plans to change this. Instead, the Port of Ploče in Croatia is used.
After World War I, in the Treaty of Versailles, a part of Germany designated "the Polish corridor" was given to the new Second Polish Republic, for access to the Baltic Sea. This gave Poland a short coastline, but without a large harbour. This was also the pretext for making Danzig (now Gdańsk) with its harbour the Free City of Danzig, to which Poland was given free access. However, the Germans placed obstacles to this free access, especially when it came to military material. In response, the small fishing harbour of Gdynia was soon greatly enlarged.
The Danube is an international waterway, and thus landlocked Austria, Hungary, Moldova, Serbia, and Slovakia have secure access to the Black Sea (the same access is given to inland parts of Germany and Croatia, though Germany and Croatia are not landlocked). However, oceangoing ships cannot use the Danube, so cargo must be transloaded anyway, and many overseas imports into Austria and Hungary use land transport from Atlantic and Mediterranean ports. A similar situation exists for the Rhine river where Switzerland has boat access, but not oceangoing ships. Luxembourg has such through the Moselle, but Liechtenstein has no boat access, even though it is located along the Rhine, as the Rhine is not navigable that far upstream.
Free ports allow transshipment to short-distance ships or river vessels.
The TIR Convention allows sealed road transport without customs checks and charges, mostly in Europe.[18]
Political repercussions
Losing access to the sea is generally a great loss to a nation, politically, militarily, and economically. The following are examples of countries becoming landlocked.
Bolivia lost its coastline to Chile in the War of the Pacific and accepted it in treaties signed in 1884 and 1904. The last treaty gives port storage facilities and special treatment for the transit of goods from and to Bolivia through Chilean ports and territory. Peru and Argentina have also given special treatment for the transit of goods. A fluvial Bolivian Navy, which did not exist at the time of the War of the Pacific, was created later and both trains and operates in Lake Titicaca and rivers. The Bolivian people annually celebrate a patriotic "Dia del Mar" (Day of the Sea) to remember its territorial loss, which included both the coastal city of Antofagasta and what has proven to be one of the most significant and lucrative copper deposits in the world. Early in the 21st century, the selection of the route of gas pipes from Bolivia to the sea fueled popular uprisings, as people were against the option of laying the pipes through Chilean territory.
Austria and Hungary also lost their access to the sea as a consequence of the Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye (1919) and the Treaty of Trianon (1920) respectively. Previously, although Croatia had a limited constitutional autonomy within the Kingdom of Hungary, the City of Fiume/Rijeka on the Croatian coast was governed directly from Budapest by an appointed governor as a corpus separatum, to provide Hungary with its only international port in the periods 1779–1813, 1822–1848 and 1868–1918. The most important ports in Austria were Trieste and Pula, now in Italy and Croatia.
It is possible that one of the causes of the Paraguayan War was Paraguay's lack of direct ocean access (although this is disputed; see the linked article).
In 2011, South Sudan broke off from the Sudan, causing the former to become landlocked. There still remains conflict over the oil fields in South Sudan between the two countries.[21]
Some countries have a long coastline, but much of it may not be readily usable for trade and commerce. For instance, in its early history, Russia's only ports were on the Arctic Ocean and frozen shut for much of the year. The wish to gain control of a warm-water port was a major motivator of Russian expansion towards the Baltic Sea, Black Sea, and Pacific Ocean. On the other hand, some landlocked countries can have access to the ocean along wide navigable rivers. For instance, Paraguay (and Bolivia to a lesser extent) have access to the ocean through the Paraguay and Paraná rivers.
Several countries have coastlines on landlocked bodies of water, such as the Caspian Sea and the Dead Sea. Since these seas are in effect lakes without access to wider seaborne trade, countries such as Kazakhstan are still considered landlocked. Although the Caspian Sea is connected to the Black Sea via the man-made Volga–Don Canal, large oceangoing ships are unable to traverse it.
Some countries or important parts of countries have coastlines or river ports reachable by oceangoing ships, but only through a strait or river part of the territory of another country. The other country can put restriction on passage. Between 1429 and 1857 Poland, Sweden, Russia and more Baltic countries were suffering from the Sound Dues, a toll needed to be paid to reach Western European waters. Sweden bypassed it by conquering Scania in 1658.
By degree
Landlocked countries may be bordered by a single country having direct access to the high seas, two or more such countries, or be surrounded by other landlocked countries, making a country doubly landlocked.
Landlocked by a single country
Three countries are landlocked by a single country (enclaved countries):
A country is "doubly landlocked" or "double-landlocked" when it is surrounded only by landlocked countries (i.e. requiring the crossing of at least two national borders to reach a coastline).[27][28] There are two such countries:
With the dissolution of Austria-Hungary in 1918 and creation of an independent, landlocked Austria, Liechtenstein became the sole doubly landlocked country until 1938. In the Anschluss that year, Austria was absorbed into Nazi Germany, which possessed a border on the Baltic Sea and the North Sea. After World War II, Austria regained its independence and Liechtenstein once again became doubly landlocked.
However, Uzbekistan's doubly landlocked status depends on if and when the Caspian Sea dispute is settled. If it is decided the Caspian is a real sea, not a lake, it would make Uzbekistan only a simple landlocked country since its neighbours Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan have access to the Caspian Sea.[31]
List of landlocked countries and landlocked de facto states
If it were not for the 40 km (25 mi) of coastline at Moanda, DR Congo would join the two African clusters into one, making it the biggest contiguous cluster in the world instead.
The Central and Southern Asian cluster and the Western Asian group can be considered contiguous, joined by the landlocked Caspian Sea. Mongolia is almost a part of this cluster too, being separated from Kazakhstan by only 30 km (19 mi), across Chinese or Russian territory.
^Paudel, R. C. (2012). "Landlockedness and Economic Growth: New Evidence"(PDF). Growth and Export Performance of Developing Countries: Is Landlockedness Destiny?. Canberra, Australia: Australian National University. pp. 13–72.
^Moseley, W. G. (2011). "Lessons from the 2008 Global Food Crisis: Agro-Food Dynamics in Mali". Development in Practice. 21 (4–5): 604–612. doi:10.1080/09614524.2011.561290. S2CID153852580.
^Iyob, Ruth (1997). The Eritrean Struggle for Independence - Domination, resistance, nationalism 1941-1993. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. pp. 11–25. ISBN978-0-521-47327-9.
^Chopra, P. N.; Puri, B. N.; Das, M. N. A Comprehensive History of India. Vol. 3. p. 298.
^Musaee, Anwar H. M.; Abbas, Eeman Muhammad; Mujani, Wan Kamal; Sidik, Roziah (2014). "Financial Analysis of Waqf Real Estate Revenues in the West Bank: 1994-2014". Asian Economic and Financial Review. 4 (10): 1260–1274. Archived from the original on 2015-09-08. Retrieved 2020-09-05. The West Bank is a landlocked territory near the eastern Mediterranean coast
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