Bhutan

Launch of the 2010 Global Human Development Report

The 20th anniversary Human Development Report 2010, "The Real Wealth of Nations: Pathways to Human Development", was launched on 9^th November, 2010 at Taj Tashi Hotel in Thimphu by Dasho Karma Ura, the President of the Centre for Bhutan Studies, and Ms. Claire Van der Vaeren, UN Resident Coordinator and UNDP Resident Representative in Bhutan. The release of the report coincided with a seminar entitled "Poverty Measurement - Going Beyond National Averages", which was organized by UNDP Bhutan. The HDR launch cum seminar was attended by academicians, researchers, development practitioners, policy makers and development partners from UN, multilateral, and bilateral agencies.

The seminar deliberations provided a highly appropriate forum for the launch of the UNDP's Global HDR. "Poverty is an inherently complex phenomenon and its understanding and measurement in a given socio-economic, cultural and geographical context presents a natural challenge." Bakhodir Burkhanov, Deputy Resident Representative, UNDP.

Discussions held during the seminar pointed out the inadequacy of poverty measurement based solely on income, and highlighted a greater need to go beyond the national level in collecting more disaggregated data and to look at other dimensions such as access to finance, land, and environment, as well as agricultural productivity to support policy analysis.

The 2010 HDR introduced several adjustments in the indicators and methodology used to calculate the HDI. Three new indices: the Inequality-adjusted Human Development Index, the Gender Inequality Index and the Multidimensional Poverty Index incorporate newly available data sets and further strengthen the HDI's statistical integrity. The seminar deliberations reflected the interest to further explore the application of the Multidimensional Poverty Index in Bhutan's context.

"Consumption in income is one type of the indicator that can be used but not sufficient. We need to look deeper and more broadly. Other indicators are emerging - multiple and composite approach will give us a better data to help formulate appropriate policy." Claire Van der Vaeren, Resident Representative, UNDP.

Bhutan was not included in this year's HDI calculations because data were missing for one of the indicators. However, a review of the trends in Bhutan's income, health and expected years of schooling shows that the country has made progress on all three indicators: income, health and education.