O Human development Index (HDI) is a statistical data created by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) to compare the data purely economic used to measure the wealth of countries and analyze development from the inclusion of others factors.
Currently, the calculation of the HDI is based on three main aspects of the population: income, education and health. Thus, the more these three aspects show improvement, the better the HDI of the location in question will be. It is clear that this index has limitations, as it does not consider other factors such as sustainability, income distribution and other important social elements.
in the question health, to calculate the HDI, life expectancy is considered, in the sense that this factor observes how “long and healthy” the lives of populations are. Already under the education, the adult literacy rate is evaluated, as well as the educational levels of the population in general. The factor “income” presents the focus on the standard of living and is measured by the
GDP per capita, which would be the Gross Domestic Product divided by the population, in addition to the PPC (Purchasing Power Parity), which performs the calculations in order to exclude the differences between the valuation of different currencies in the countries.Thus, for the HDI to be calculated, an average weighting between these three factors is carried out, which must have the same weight, as it is considered that health, education and income are equally important elements to guarantee the human development of the population. The result ranges from 0 to 1, so that the closer to the maximum value, the greater the human development in a given location.
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Below, we can see the categories under which countries are divided based on their respective HDIs:
low HDI: brings together all countries with an HDI below 0.500.
Average HDI: countries with an HDI between 0.500 and 0.799.
high HDI: countries with human development between 0.800 and 0.899.
very high HDI: countries whose index is equal to or above 0.900.
The HDI data are published in annual reports by the United Nations (UN), which may show large variations from year to year, especially if there are changes in mathematical methods employees.
In 2013, the three countries with the highest HDI were Norway (0.944), Australia (0.933) and Switzerland (0.917), with only ten countries having an HDI considered “very high”. Brazil occupies the 79th position, with an HDI of 0.744, being considered, therefore, “average”. Among the countries with “low” HDI, almost all are from the African continent, with emphasis on the last placed: Niger (0.337), Democratic Republic of Congo (0.338) and Central African Republic (0,341).
*Data source: UNDP Brazil – Global HDI Ranking 2013.
By Me. Rodolfo Alves Pena
Would you like to reference this text in a school or academic work? Look:
PENA, Rodolfo F. Alves. "How is the HDI calculated?"; Brazil School. Available in: https://brasilescola.uol.com.br/geografia/desenvolvimento-humano.htm. Accessed on June 27, 2021.
