✅Norway - how do the descendants of the Vikings live? 10 things you didn't know about

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

How much does a cleaning lady and a waiter earn per month in Norway? Is everything so good there with the environment? And is it true in this country that everyone gets a percentage of the sale of oil? Let's figure it out.

There are just over 5 million people living in all of Norway. Most of the territory is practically untouched countryside. Vast forests, clean rivers, lakes, waterfalls. Including the deepest lake and highest waterfall in Europe. And, of course, the Fjords cutting into the rocky shores. They are extremely picturesque, and not only the world famous “trolltongue” and “pulpit”, but also many others … Through these fjords the Norwegians are going to build car tunnels floating in the water column. These hybrids of the tunnel and bridge are planned to be laid across the country by 2035. If the project is implemented, the road along the sea for motorists will take 10 hours instead of 21 hours due to the refusal of ferry crossings. But besides the beauty and grandiose engineering projects, there is something connected with the fjords that is not told to tourists.

Ecology

The Kingdom of Norway is practically the only country that has not signed an international agreement banning the storage of waste at sea. Because it is an old Norwegian tradition - to dump the toxic dumps of the mining industry into our own fjords, this has been done here for half a century and is being done now. Wild salmon enter these same fjords, which seem to be a national treasure, along with the migration routes of ocean cod. And the cases when the presence of salts of heavy metals is found in the caught fish cease to be a sensation and become boring everyday life. Please, so to speak, taste the signature Norwegian salmon with salt … heavy metals.

Another point is the fishing of this very Atlantic wild salmon in the Barents Sea, which is carried out by Norwegian fishermen. They use the bottom traction method, which is the most destructive mining method for marine life. After such fishing, restoration of the bottom ecosystem takes from one and a half to six and a half years. Norway is regularly heavily criticized by the North Atlantic Salmon Fund (yes, there is one, imagine) for not sufficiently opposing this fishery. With all this, the Scandinavians seriously consider themselves leaders in the field of environmental conservation. There is a gradual abandonment of cars with gasoline engines, Norway ranks first in the world in the number of electric vehicles.

The country is known for its environmental programs implemented in other countries. So, from the sovereign fund, which we will talk about later, more than one billion euros was allocated to preserve the tropical forests of Brazil. A similar program has been implemented in Indonesia, Liberia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. At the same time, in Norway itself, only 2.4 percent of the forests are classified as "relic", they are not touched. The rest is being successfully mastered by the timber industry. Norway has a leading role in the global pulp and paper market. So the news that Norway is the first country in the world to stop deforestation is not true. Deforestation there is carried out, but within the framework of productive forestry.

Migrants

Norway has no particular problem with migrants, unlike many European countries. Migration policy changed after Breivik, who justified his actions with a protest against the policy of multiculturalism. The Norwegian authorities unequivocally condemned what happened. But at the same time, they began to gradually tighten their immigration policy. They feared that if they left everything as it was, it could happen again.

Income

Norway today is one of the developed countries in the world, with a high level of income and quality of life. But it was not always so. Just half a century ago, Norway was still an agrarian country, full of farmers and fishermen, barely making ends meet. But in 1969, the Norwegians discovered life-giving oil. Oil and natural gas now account for 57% of Norway's economy. The country ranks 10th among the world's oil exporters and the 3rd largest exporter of natural gas. Only we and Canada are overtaking it. And almost half of the money from oil production is set aside, where and why - we will tell you a little later. Let's talk about salaries first. According to information from the Statistics Office of the Kingdom, the average salary of employees in 2018 was just over 4, 600 €. In our wooden ones it will be 325 thousand.