Haifa Ranked Among World's Happiest Cities by UK Institute

Haifa has been included in a global ranking of the world's happiest cities, securing the 187th position out of 251 cities surveyed. Published by the British-based Institute for Quality of Life, this is the only Israeli city to make the list. The ranking is based on 64 measurable indicators, including health, income, governance, environment, and urban planning, rather than subjective resident feelings. The study involved 466 researchers worldwide.

Copenhagen topped the list, followed by Helsinki, Geneva, Uppsala, and Tokyo. Haifa's position places it between Tashkent and Split, but ahead of cities like Bratislava and Buenos Aires. It also ranked higher than London (193rd) and New York (207th). Kyiv was symbolically placed last at 251st without a score to highlight the conditions faced by its residents under Russian attacks.

The inclusion of Haifa as the sole Israeli representative is attributed to the rigorous methodology. Out of an initial 3,400 cities considered, approximately 1,000 underwent in-depth analysis. Ultimately, 251 cities were selected based on the availability of comparable and verified data. While 25 Israeli cities were initially considered, and 16 progressed to the detailed analysis phase, only Haifa and Jerusalem had data deemed sufficiently complete, reliable, and transparent to proceed. Following further evaluation, Haifa emerged as the sole Israeli city to remain in the final ranking.

Haifa's strengths highlighted in the report include urban innovation, a high proportion of higher education graduates, foreign language proficiency, employment in creative sectors, GDP growth per capita, low youth unemployment, and the number of libraries. However, the city received lower scores in areas such as the cost of higher education relative to salaries, student-to-teacher ratios, fine particulate pollution, low recycling rates, the number of cultural institutions and businesses per capita, and its homicide rate.