HUMAN DEVELOPMENT INDEX

GENDER DEVELOPMENT INDEX (GDI)

&
GENDER EMPOWERMENT MEASURE
(GEM)
• The Human Development Index (HDI) is a
composite statistic of life expectancy,
education, and income indices used to rank
countries into four tiers of human
development. It was created by a Pakistani
economist Mahbub ul Haq and Indian
economist Amartya Sen in 1990 and was
published by the United Nations Development
Programme.
• The basic objective of development as stated
by the first Human Development Report in
1990, “is to create an enabling environment in
which people can enjoy long, healthy and
creative lives”.
• Human Development Index (HDI): A
composite index measuring average
achievement in three basic dimensions of
human development—
A long and healthy life,
Knowledge and
A decent standard of living.
• Some countries were not included for various
reasons, mainly the unavailability of certain
crucial data. The following United Nations
Member States were not included in the 2014
report:North Korea, Marshall
Islands,Monaco, Nauru, San
Marino, Somalia, South Sudan, and Tuvalu
 The top 10 "very high human development" countries
(2014):
HDI Value
1. Norway 0.944
2. Australia 0.933
3. Switzerland 0.917
4. Netherland 0.915
5. US 0.914
6. Germany 0.911
7. New Zealand 0.910
8. Canada 0.902
9. Singapore 0.901
10. Denmark 0.900
135 . India 0.586
 On the occasion of the UN world conference in
Beijing, the UNDP Human Development Bureau
prepared and released The Human Development
Report 1995 subtitled Gender and Human
Development.
 The report highlighted the disparities among men
and women in various indicators of Human
Development around the world.
 The most important contribution of the report is
the introduction of two special indices for
measuring gendered inequality, the GDI (Gender-
related Development Index) and the GEM
(Gender Empowerment Measure).
WHY LOOK AT GENDER AND INDICATORS?

• They enable better planning and actions.

• Gender indicators can be used to evaluate the
outcomes of gender-focused and mainstream
interventions and policies and help reveal barriers
to achieving success.
• They can provide vital information for adjusting
programmes and activities so that they better
achieve gender equality goals and do not create
adverse impacts on women and men.
While the HDI measures average achievement, the GDI
adjusts the average achievement to reflect the
inequalities between men and women in the following
dimensions:

• A long and healthy life, as measured by life

expectancy at birth.
• Knowledge as measured by the adult literacy
rate and the combined gross enrolment ratio.
• A decent standard of living, as measured by
estimated earned income
 GENDER DEVELOPMENT INDEX

• The Gender Development Index is an index

designed to measure of gender equality. GDI
and GEM were introduced in 1995 in the
Human Development Report written by
United Nations Development Program.
• The aim of these measurements was to add a
gender sensitive dimension to the Human
Development Index.
• The GDI is often considered a ‘gender sensitive
extension of the HDI’. It addresses gender gaps in
life expectancy , education, and incomes.
• In terms of life expectancy, the GDI assumes that
women will live an average of five years longer
than men , in terms of income, the GDI considers
income gaps in terms of actual earned income.
• The GDI cannot be used independently from the
Human Development Index and cannot be used
on its own as an indicator of gender gaps.
• The GDI is the ratio of the HDIs calculated
separately for females and males using the same
methodology as in the HDI.
• It is a direct measure of gender gap showing the
female HDI as a Percentage of the male HDI.
• The GDI is calculated for 161 countries. Countries
are grouped into five groups based on the
absolute deviation from gender parity in HDI
values.
• The GDI shows how much women are laggin
behind their male counterparts and how
much women need to catch up within each
dimension of human development.
• It is good for understanding the real gender
gap in human development achievements and
is useful to design policy tools to close the
gap.
 The Gender Empowerment Measure
(GEM)
• The Gender Empowerment Measure is a
measure of inequalities between men’s and
women’s opportunities in a country. It
combines inequalities in three aspects:
Political participation and decision making
power, as measured by women‘s and men‘s
percentage share of parliamentary seats
Economic participation and decision-making
power, as measured by two indicators –
 women‘s and men‘s percentage shares of
positions as legislators, senior officials and
managers.
women‘s and men‘s percentage share of
professional and technical positions.
Power over economic resources, as measured
by women‘s and men‘s estimated earned
income
• The new Gender Development Index (GDI),
which for the first time measures the gender
gap in human development achievements for
148 countries, reveals that in 16 of them
(Argentina, Barbados, Belarus, Estonia, Finland,
Kazakhstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Mongolia, Poland,
Russian Federation, Slovakia, Slovenia, Sweden,
Ukraine and Uruguay), female HDI values are
equal or higher than those for males.
• This may be attributed to higher female
educational achievement; for others, to a
significantly longer female life expectancy -
over five years longer than that of males.
Afghanistan, where the human development
index for females is only 60 percent of that for
males, is the most unequal country.
• Worldwide, female HDI values are eight
percent lower than those for males, with
large variations between countries. However,
the GDI shows that the disparity between
genders in the estimated gross national
income per capita is very high: per capita
income for men at the global level is more
than double that for women.
 Critique of GDI and GEM

• The GDI has been criticized for failing to take

into account important aspects such as the
quality of community life, human rights and
access to basic amenities. Issues as violence
against women or restrictions placed on
women‘s capacity to be mobile or household
allocation of resources do not get any
reflection in the GDI.
• The GEM is also criticized because it too is
based only on three variables and therefore
defines empowerment very narrowly. It
ignores legal and human rights and does not
take into account cultural constructions and
related practices that disempower women.
• The GEM has also been criticized on the
grounds that its components were related to
characteristics of power more appropriate to
the developed countries.
• The argument was that there would not be
professional associations of women and there
would be few women in parliament in
developing countries, but in these countries
participation of women in other types of
organisations such as cooperatives, trade
associations and community organizations
may indicate empowerment which is not
reflected in the statistics on which GEM is
based.
• It has been argued that majority of women in
underdeveloped countries are doing work that
is invisible to valuation in the mainstream
male-defined world of statistics relating to
work and income. The GDI and GEM indices
based on per capita income and work
participations rates therefore, are not
accurate measures for the developing
countries.
 Gender Inequality Index
• A composite measure reflecting inequality in
achievement between women and men in three
dimensions: reproductive health, empowerment
and the labor market.
• The GII shows an overall decline. However,
despite improvements in health, and incremental
progress on education and parliamentary
representation, women’s empowerment is still
lagging. Slovenia ranks most favourably on this
index, while Yemen shows the highest gender
inequality.
 Global threats to human
development
• Economic, social and environmental shocks
have a major impact on people’s lives and are
a key challenge to sustaining and advancing
human development. Unpredictable changes
in market conditions, the environment and
social perceptions can have dramatic
destabilizing effects—restricting current and
future choices of individuals and households
and hampering the progress of entire
societies.
 Food price volatility
• Food price volatility has become a growing
threat to food security and thus to human
development. Agricultural prices are
inherently variable, but food prices have
fluctuated considerably and unexpectedly
since 2007.
• High and volatile food prices can have long-
term consequences on the physical and
mental well-being of individuals, as poor
households are forced to switch to cheaper
but less nutritious food, cut portion sizes and
even forgo meals. They may also need to work
longer hours or give up other spending on
health or education.
• In the near future, however, they are likely to
remain high and volatile. Because population
growth and rising incomes in emerging and
developing economies are pushing demand to
record levels. Prices are likely to be more
volatile as a consequence of the higher
frequency of extreme weather events, the
financialization of commodity markets and the
volatility in exchange rates.
 Natural disasters

• More frequent and intense environmental

disasters are destroying lives, livelihoods,
physical infrastructure and fragile ecosystems.
They can impair human capabilities and
threaten human development.
 Violent conflict

• Armed conflicts impose enormous costs on

individuals, communities and countries. In
addition to the loss of lives, they destroy
livelihoods, generate insecurity and disrupt
social services, institutions and markets.
Conflicts can also cause large population
displacements.
• The world has always been subject to
uncertainty and unpredictability. But the
growing frequency and severity of economic
and environmental shocks threaten human
development. That makes it vital to adopt
bold national and international policies to
reduce the vulnerability of individuals,
communities and countries and to increase
their resilience.
“Reducing both poverty and people's
vulnerability to falling into poverty must
be a central objective of human
development. Eliminating extreme
poverty is not just about 'getting to
zero'; it is also about staying there”.