Independent Countries with Less than 50,000 People
We know you’re already saying Vatican City as the least populated independent country in the world. Yer right. Nevertheless, we wanted to get a bit of a different kind of list together to see if we can include a thing or two that might help all of us remember this information. So for each country, we’ve shown the population, land area in sq. mi., and official languages.
The population figures come from CIA World Factbook. Almost all of the population estimates on its list comparing countries by population are as of July 2017. If not, the year is noted.
Here are the places on the CIA’s list that are not totally independent, by the countries they are governed by, or that provide their defense, if they are self governed (indicated by *)
AUSTRALIA
2,210 NORFOLK ISLAND (est. 2014)
2,205 CHRISTMAS ISLAND (est. 2016)
596 COCOS (KEELING) ISLANDS (est. 2014)
FRANCE
32,125 SAINT MARTIN
15,714 WALLIS AND FUTUNA
7,184 SAINT BARTHELEMY
5,533 SAINT PIERRE AND MIQUELON
THE NETHERLANDS
42,083 SINT MAARTEN*
NEW ZEALAND
9,290 COOK ISLANDS*
1,626 NIUE (est. 2015)*
1,285 TOKELAU
NORWAY
2,667 SVALBARD (est. 2016)
UNITED KINGDOM:
35,015 BRITISH VIRGIN ISLANDS
29,396 GIBRALTAR
17,087 ANGUILLA
7,828 SAINT HELENA, ASCENSION, AND TRISTAN DA CUNHA
5,292 MONTSERRAT
2,931 FALKLAND ISLANDS (est. 2014) (ISLAS MALVINAS – also claimed by Argentina)
54 PITCAIRN ISLANDS (est. 2016)
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Well, Cece, I just found out that Ngerulmud has only been the capital of Palau since 2006. Before that, it was Koror City. Here’s this news report (from 2010) on the sparsely populated capital, where the then-President is saying he’s going to declare the area around it a tax-free zone to get folks to move there. Guess it didn’t work (most sources put Ngerulmud’s population under 400 people).
It’s funny that the narrator never once says the capital’s name. There’s a youtube telling how to say it, making the N silent, but on Forvo, a native speaker makes the G silent.
I hear you on flags. The symbols on some are très cool, but I can’t retain all that.
Thanks, VJ. Now Koror was a lot easier to say and remember. Not that this place will ever come up in conversation. 🙂
I have faith that one of us will run into someone who is bragging about their recent trip to Palau and out of the recesses of our memory banks, you will pull out the names of both of those cities. LOL!!! (If it’s me, it’ll probably just be Koror though)
I say we’ll both remember the 2 cities, if only because of our weird conversation.
They had a clue today on that area of the world, Cece! But it wasn’t anything on here because the one that it was has a population a little over 100K. (Won’t spoil it for you)
I’m just seeing this today—nice post, thanks VJ. I recall Nauru coming up on J! only once, 4 or 5 years ago, maybe? Palau just doesn’t stick in my brain as a nation, but I remember it coming up a few times.
Wouldn’t it be funny if any of these come up on J! soon.
Glad you liked it, Cece. If something does come up, I hope it’s not Palau’s capital… that one just doesn’t stick in my brain! I didn’t find any clues with Ngerulmud in the clue or as the response on J-Archive, despite this one: “ATOLLS ($200) Perhaps the only world capital we’ve never before asked about is Funafuti, an atoll in this ocean: it’s Tuvalu’s capital”
I wonder if I could remember the country if spotted the capital!
Anyhow, check this out: they once devoted a whole category to Palau. So many things to remember – official languages, flag, currency, food. lol
I usually use word associations to recall info, but with Ngerulmud, umm, let’s see…Niger (w/out the “i”) and mud, but what about that “ul” in the middle…Forget it, you’re on your own, VJ.
Now I’ll probably remember Ngerulmud and be like, argh, what’s the country, again?? Oh, I’ll think of a pow wow in muddy Niger. There you go.
Wow, a whole category on Palau and not one TS. And contestants tend to flame out on Central America. Go figure. 🙂
Btw, I don’t do flags; don’t have the patience and/or desire to learn them. Once I decided to check all the flags that don’t have the color red on them. I abandoned the exercise in a short while. Decided to get a life, instead.