13 Amazing Facts About Sweden

Before we begin, make sure you read our latest blog on “9 Interesting Facts About Oman” for some insightful information.

1: Did you know, that the first Nicotine product – Nicorette – was developed by Leo AB in Helsingborg. It followed the observation that smoking Swedish submariners would switch from tobacco to chewing tobacco or snus to receive their nicotine fix when on duty.

2: The longest art gallery in the world is the Stockholm metro, opened in 1950, which is well known for the decor of its stations. Also, Stockholm is famed for its iconic city hall, the world’s first open-air museum and the fabulous Abba museum, which is quite amazing right? Ericsson Globe, located just south of Stockholm’s Södermalm district, is the world’s largest hemispherical building.

3: Did you know, that The first ice hotel of the world was built near the village of Jukkasjärvi, Swede? It is a traveler’s paradise and is often referred to as ‘Venice of the North’.  

4: Skansen, the world’s oldest open-air museum, is a historic village made up of houses and farmsteads from all over Sweden, representing both rural and urban culture at various periods from 1720 to the 1960s.

5: In recent years, artists like Avicii, Swedish House Mafia and Icona Pop have given Swedish music even more visibility. ABBA is the fourth-best selling music act in history, after Elvis Presley, the Beatles, and Michael Jackson. The group has sold over 375 million records worldwide. At one point, ABBA was second only to Volvo as Sweden’s biggest export earner.

6: You’d be surprised to know that Sweden was the first country in the world to allow for a legal change of gender identity ,and legalized homosexuality in 1944.

7: Located up in Sweden’s Arctic Lapland Region, the ICEHOTEL is kept at a steady -4°C inside to preserve all the hand-sculpted ice artworks and ice furnishings.

8: Born in Småland in 1701, Carl von Linné, née Carl Linnaeus, is Sweden’s most revered scientist. He is best known for the introduction of his binomial classification, a two-part nomenclature that enabled plants and animals to be consistently named and classified into families. 

9: In Sweden, there are about 300, 000 – 400, 000 moose roaming freely in the woods. The moose could potentially form one of the biggest cities in Sweden if they gathered as one group.

10: Sweden have the highest number of Mcdonald’s restaurants in Europe per capita. So, there’s definitely not a shortage of fast food here!

11: The Swedish people love to recycle. Only 1% of waste ends up in landfill with 50% being recycled or composted and 49% being incinerated for energy. This may sound like great news but it has caused one big problem: there’s not enough waste left to keep the incinerators running.

Number 12: Despite being a military power in the 17th century and one of the world’s largest producers of weapons, Sweden has not participated in any war for almost two centuries, including both world wars.

Number 13: In Sweden’s capital city Stockholm, you could win the lottery for obeying traffic laws. Introduced by the idea of Kevin Richardson, a portion of the money collected from speeders, goes into a lottery for law abiders to win. Seems quirky, right?

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