Water stress (internal resources)

The Netherlands faces 80 times more water stress than Latvia despite both being European nations.

OECDUpdated Dec '25

Summary

Lowest 5 Water-Stressed Countries

1Latvia
1.1 %
2Sweden
1.4 %
3Brazil
1.5 %
4Lithuania
2 %
5Croatia
2.7 %
Dataset Median
13 %

Highest 5 Water-Stressed Countries

25Bulgaria
32.6 %
26Belgium
41.1 %
27Israel
59.4 %
28Hungary
78.5 %
29Netherlands
86.6 %

Gap

80x

Netherlands vs Latvia: 80x water stress gap

Leader

1.07

Latvia leads with lowest water stress

Gap

81x

81x gap between best and worst performers

Data

29 results

1Latvia1.1 %
2Sweden1.4 %
3Brazil1.5 %
4Lithuania2.0 %
5Croatia2.7 %
6Australia3.0 %
7Costa Rica3.5 %
8Slovakia4.1 %
9Colombia5.3 %
10Luxembourg5.4 %

Map

Water stress (internal resources)

86.6 %
1.1 %

Insights

Generated automatically using AI

Gap

80x

Netherlands has 80x higher water stress than Latvia despite both being in Europe

Leader

1.07

Latvia has the lowest water stress globally at just 1.07

Gap

81x

Water stress ranges from 1.07 to 86.58 showing massive global inequality

Outlier

86.58

Netherlands ranks dead last globally despite being a developed nation

Cluster

4 of 5

Four of five Nordic/Baltic nations rank in the top 10 for water security

Methodology

This dataset is sourced from the OECD through its official SDMX data service.
Rankdat does not alter or model the underlying values — we only clean formats, standardize country names, and reshape the data for visualization.

OECD compiles these indicators from a mix of sources including national statistical offices, international household surveys (such as Gallup World Poll, EU-SILC, ISSP), and harmonised administrative datasets.
Each indicator follows the definitions and structure specified in the OECD’s Data Structure Definition (DSD) for this dataflow.

Because indicators originate from different countries and surveys, collection years, sampling methods, and questionnaire wording may vary. OECD applies harmonisation rules to improve comparability, but differences in national methodology may still affect cross-country comparisons.

Full definitions, data collection notes, and quality documentation are available through the OECD metadata portal linked in the Sources section.

Source