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Guyana’s Human Development index increases by 17.6 percent – UNDP Report
Minister of Finance, Winston Jordan (second from right) receiving the report from UNDP Resident Representative, Shabnam Malick
as UG’s Vice Chancellor, Ivelaw Griffith (left) and Finance Secretary, Dr. Hector Butts (right) look on.
Guyana’s Human Development Index (HDI) value as of 2015 is 0.638 which places the country in the medium human development category. It now ranks at 127 out of 188 countries. This is a 17.6 percent increase from the country’s HDI value in 1990 which stood at 0.541.
This was disclosed yesterday at the launch of the Human Development Report 2016 at the New Lecture Theatre, University of Guyana, Turkeyen Campus. Delivering the feature remarks at the event was Minister of Finance, Winston Jordan.
Jordan said that for the past 25 years, the global arena has witnessed several paradigm shifts in relation to how it views human development reports.
The Minister said that the theme in this year’s report, “Human development for everyone” reflects the new focus on all inclusive human development. “This is expected to place greater emphasis on unemployment, redistribution of growth and the basic needs of people.”
He said that the theme resonates with his government’s priority, which is to achieve a good life for all Guyanese. According to him, the approach taken by the APNU+AFC government champions inclusivity and has guided all budget preparations and presentations since 2015.
Jordan said that Guyana’s ranking of 0.638 is slightly above the average of other countries of 0.631. He said that nevertheless, 126 countries were ranked higher than Guyana while 61 fared worst.
He said that although Guyana is trending in the right direction, the nation’s current ranking is a clarion reminder that Guyana must work harder and smarter to conquer the scourge of poverty.
The Minister added that while Guyana tries to achieve the Human Development Goals as well as its personal goals, the country must consciously and deliberately allocate the resources to achieve the needed results.
He said that more importantly, the country needs to develop ways on achieving intended results based on evidence supported by robust data and analytical findings that the data-rich systems provide.
Also speaking at the event was Resident Representative for UNDP, Ms Shabnam Mallick who said that the Human Development Report is the flagship report of the UNDP. She said that Human Development is a concept within International Development, a process concerned with enhancing people’s choices, allowing them to lead a long and healthy life, to be educated, to enjoy a decent standard of living and various ingredients of self-respect.
According to Ms Mallick, the practice of Human Development is to channel the distribution of goods and services necessary for basic human development to underprivileged areas where these resources will be most needed.
She said that millions of people are unable to reach their full potential in life because of deprivations in multiple dimensions of human development.
She added that the 2016 report focuses on how Human Development can be assured for everyone, now and in the future.
“The report explores who has been left behind in human development progress and why. Human development progress for the last 25 years has been impressive on many fronts but the gains have not been universal. There are imbalances across countries, socio-economic, ethnic and racial groups, urban and rural populations, women and men.”
Presenting data on Guyana was Programme Specialist of UNDP, Dr. Patrick Chesney. He said that in computing the HDI, there are three dimensions that are considered; long and healthy life, knowledge and decent standard of living.
He said that life expectancy at birth for Guyanese increased by three years since 1990 to 66.5 years; mean years of schooling increased by 1.6 years and expected years of schooling increased by 0.2 years to 10.3 years as of 2015.
Closing the ceremony was Finance Secretary of the Ministry of Finance, Dr. Hector Butts who said that the index should not be seen as evaluative because of problems with statistical data such as consistency and credibility.
He said that currently Guyana is trying to improve its data accessibility. Butts mentioned that one move in this direction was the recent commissioning of a new building for the National Bureau of Statistics.
Further, he said that Guyanese must take what is presented in the report, with a pinch of salt and see the results more as informing that Guyana is growing and that the road to success is through education. Butts said that there is a commitment from the government’s part to continue and recognise that each citizen has room to realise their potential.
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