Human development: Pakistan among most improved in UN report

Country among most improved compared to global competitors.

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has been ranked 10th in terms of human development improvement by the United Nations Development Programme’s 20th Human Development Report 2010.

Those among the 135 countries that improved most in Human Development Index (HDI) over the past 30 years were led by Oman, which invested energy earnings over the decades in education and public health. The other nine “Top Movers” were China, Nepal, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, Laos, Tunisia, South Korea, Algeria and Morocco. Remarkably, China was the only country that made the “Top 10” list solely due to income performance. The main drivers of HDI achievement were in health and education.

The UNDP report stated that between 1980 and 2010, the HDI value increased by 58 per cent (average annual increase of about 1.5 per cent) in Pakistan.

“With such an increase, Pakistan is ranked 10th in terms of HDI improvement, which measures progress in comparison to the average progress of countries with a similar initial HDI level,” said the report.

Pakistan’s life expectancy at birth increased by more than nine years while mean years of schooling increased by about nine years and expected years of schooling increased by almost 4 years. Pakistan’s Gross National Income (GNI) per capita increased by 92 per cent during the same period. In 1980, Pakistan, India and Bangladesh had similar HDI values. However, between 1980 and 2010, the three countries experienced different degrees of progress toward increasing their HDIs, the report stated.

The report also introduced the Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI), which identifies multiple deprivations in education, health and standard of living. The average percentage of deprivation experienced by people in multidimensional poverty was 54 per cent. The MPI, which is the share of the population that is multi-dimensionally poor, adjusted by the intensity of the deprivations, was 0.275 for Pakistan, whereas, India and Bangladesh, had MPIs of 0.296 and 0.291, respectively.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 28^th, 2011.