–up from 0.516 in 1980 to 0.638 in 2013

GUYANA’S Human Development Index (HDI) for the year 2013 has recorded an unprecedented increase of 23.6 per cent between 1980 and 2013, according to the 2014 Human Development Report (HDR) presented by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).

The HDI is a summary measure for assessing long-term progress in three basic dimensions of human development: A long and healthy life, access to knowledge, and a decent standard of living.
The report which presented the HDI (values and ranks) for 187 countries and UN-recognized territories also includes the Inequality-adjusted HDI for 145 countries, the Gender Development Index for 148 countries, the Gender Inequality Index for 149 countries, and the Multidimensional Poverty Index for 91 countries.
Officially handed over yesterday to Minister of Finance Dr Ashni Singh, the Human Development report, presented under the theme ‘Sustaining Human Progress: Reducing Vulnerabilities and Building Resilience’, revealed that Guyana is currently listed at 121 out of a total of 187 countries and territories. The position of this country is also shared by Vietnam, and is considered a medium human development category on the international stage.

“While it would be easy to say that Guyana’s HDI only improved or stayed at 121 in 2013, it would be useful to observe that during the 2000 to 2013 period, Guyana’s HDI actually improved by an average of 0.87 per cent, which is a stronger performance than many countries that have economies much stronger than ours, countries that are much more active than ours”
–Finance Minister Dr. Ashni Singh

According to the Finance Minister, a steady trend of improvements in almost all of the key indicators was recorded. Between 1980 and 2013, Guyana’s life expectancy at birth increased by 5.7 years, mean years of schooling increased by 2.7 years, and expected years of schooling increased by one year.
The Country’s Gross National Income(GNI) per capita increased by about 173.9 percent between 1980 and 2013, while the overall HDI value improved from 0.516 to 0.638 between those years.

COMPARATOR COUNTRIES
According to Singh, statistical data is a reflection of historical events which vastly influence data fluctuation. He stressed that “behind the data” analysis is a step usually not taken when seeking to arrive at conclusions on what has been achieved. Often times, he emphasized, superficial analyses relate that “we are behind Barbados, or we are behind Trinidad and Tobago, or we are behind Jamaica.” This, however, is a clear misconception, he said, noting that if a look is taken at the data contained in the report, a useful insight is provided as to where the country is, why the country is where it is, and the direction in which it is moving.
“For example if we take GNI per capita, indeed it has moved 173.9 per cent from 1980 to 2013, but that movement has not been a strictly linear movement because in-fact our GNI per capita declined very significantly between 1980 and 1990” Singh said.

He continued that it decreased from 2,315 in 1980 to 1,312 in 1990 and during that short ten year period, GNI per capita in-fact was decimated by almost half the amount. “The period from 1990 to 2013, it has increased significantly, from 1,312 to 6,341. In-fact if you take the long window, period which is 1980 to 2013, you can say that Guyana’s GNI has increased by 173.9 per cent” he noted.
The Finance Minister, however, explained that this model could be used in comparing the HDI value of Guyana which also dipped from 0.516 in 1980 to 0.505 in 1990. Subsequent to this, there was a steady increase from 1990 to 2013. As such he urged that when opting to compare ourselves to some of the regional comparators like Barbados, we are usually harsh and question why these other countries are performing better than Guyana.
“But when we ask ourselves why we are not where Barbados, Jamaica or Trinidad is, if we look at Barbados or any other regional counterparts, between the 1980 and 1990 period when Guyana’s HDI declined, Barbados’s and other counterparts’ HDI were growing during that period” the Minister said.
During that time, he said, if a graph was drawn as a representation, it would reveal that while those countries would have been experiencing a progressive scale, Guyana was dipping slowly.

STEADY TREND
Dr. Singh, however, boasted of the steady improvements in the key areas of analysation, stressing that after the dipping period between 1980 and 1990, Guyana saw a steady increase in every area. To this extent, the HDI value increased from 0.505 in 1990 to 0.638 in 2013 and 1,312 GNI per capita in 1990, to 6,341 in 2013. “In post 1990, Guyana improved an average every year of 1.22 per cent, while Barbados improved by 0.54 per cent, Trinidad by 0.58 per cent and Jamaica, 0.51 per cent” he said.
During this period between 1990 and 2013, he stressed, Guyana improved more rapidly than its regional comparators. As such, he noted that while Caribbean countries were continuing to grow over the years, Guyana was starting to play “catch-up” as a result of the drop between 1980 and 1990.
“While it would be easy to say that Guyana’s HDI only improved or stayed at 121 in 2013, it would be useful to observe that during the 2000 to 2013 period, Guyana’s HDI actually improved by an average of 0.87 per cent, which is a stronger performance than many countries that have economies much stronger than ours, countries that are much more active than ours” Singh emphasized.
Delivering a formal presentation on the official handing over of the report was UNDP’s Resident Representative, Chisa Mikami who noted that the progress of human development is not only a matter of enlarging people’s critical choices and their ability to be educated, be healthy, have a decent standard of living and feel safe. It is also a matter of how secure these achievements are and whether conditions are sufficient to sustain human development.
Mikami explained that an account of progress in human development is incomplete without exploring and assessing vulnerability. She continued that “human development involves removing the barriers that hold people back in their freedom to act, it is a enabling the disadvantaged and excluded to realise their rights, to express their concerns openly, to be heard and to become active agents in shaping their destiny”.
Mikami indicated that the overall global trend is positive, with an overall decline in inequality. She stressed that improvements were also recorded in health and while it was observed that the older generation struggle with illiteracy and the younger generation find their struggle “stepping” from primary to the secondary level in school.

Elaborating more extensively on the general report was Patrick Chesney who, to ensure as much cross-country comparability as possible, said the HDI is based primarily on international data from the United Nations Population Division; the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation Institute for Statistics, and the World Bank.

Chesney related that the aim of post 2015 will be to achieve 0 hunger and poverty. He continued that the achieving 0 is however not enough, but it is rather maintaining the 0. As such, he stressed that factors such as $1.2B people earning less than $1.5US a day and 842M people suffering from chronic hunger must be eliminated. According to the programme specialist, 1.5 million people live in countries affected by conflict.

To combat this, however, he assured that the UNDP proposes new concepts and ideas aimed at rectifying these ills. Universalism too, he said, is a key factor when considering the challenges posed. As such, resources are required to be channeled in the right direction while dedication plays an integral role and is the core message of human development.

GENDER IN-EQUALITY INDEX (GII)
Additionally, Guyana has a GII value of 0.524, ranking it 113 out of 149 countries in the 2013 index. In Guyana, 31.3 percent of parliamentary seats are held by women, and 61.5 percent of adult women have reached at least a secondary level of education compared to 48.8 percent of their male counterparts. For every 100,000 live births, 280.0 women die from pregnancy related causes; and the adolescent birth rate is 88.5 births per 1000 live births. Female participation in the labour market is 42.3 percent compared to 80.9 for men.

GENDER DEVELOPMENT INDEX (GDI)
Also, the GDI measures gender inequalities in achievement in three basic dimensions of human development—health (measured by female and male life expectancy at birth), education (measured by female and male expected years of schooling for children and mean years for adults aged 25 years and older); and command over economic resources (measured by female and male estimated GNI per capita). The GDI is calculated for 148 countries. The 2013 female HDI value for Guyana is 0.629 in contrast with 0.638 for males, resulting in a GDI value of 0.985. In comparison, GDI values for Suriname and Belize are 0.974 and 0.963 respectively

MULTIDIMENSIONAL POVERTY INDEX (MPI)
The 2010 Human Development Report introduced the Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI), which identifies multiple deprivations in the same households in education, health and living standards. The education and health dimensions are each based on two indicators, while the standard of living dimension is based on six indicators. All of the indicators needed to construct the MPI for a household are taken from the same household survey. The indicators are weighted to create a deprivation score, and the deprivation scores are computed for each household in the survey.

In Guyana 7.8 percent of the population are multidimensionally poor, while an additional 18.8 percent are near multidimensional poverty. The breadth of deprivation (intensity) in Guyana, which is the average of deprivation scores experienced by people in multidimensional poverty, is 40.0 percent. The MPI, which is the share of the population that is multi-dimensionally poor, adjusted by the intensity of the deprivations, is 0.031.

(By Ravin Singh)