Human development to decline for the first time since 1990 due to coronavirus

A new United Nations Development Programme report warns of deteriorating health, education and quality of life conditions. The COVID-19 pandemic is also widening the gap. Only the implementation of coordinated measures based on equality could limit the effects of the crisis. The coronavirus pandemic could reverse global human development for the first time since 1990, calculated as a combination of educational, health and living conditions factors worldwide, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) warned this week. The study points out that setbacks in basic elements of human development are already underway in most countries of all regions, whether rich or poor. 

Thus, after the death of 350,000 people as a result of COVID-19, estimates for this year point to a 4% drop in global per capita income.  Another factor to take into account is that, with school closures, UNPD estimates of the “effective out-of-school rate” * indicate that 60 per cent of children are not getting an education, leading to global levels not seen since the 1980s.

The study stresses that "The combined impact of these shocks could signify the largest reversal in human development on record." “The world has seen many crises over the past 30 years, including the Global Financial Crisis of 2007-09. Each has hit human development hard but, overall, development gains accrued globally year-on-year,” said UNDP Administrator Achim Steiner. “COVID-19 – with its triple hit to health, education, and income – may change this trend.”

The report predicts that the drop in human development will be much greater in developing countries than in richer ones, as the former have fewer resources to manage the social and economic effects of the pandemic.

In education, with schools closed and stark divides in access to online learning, UNDP estimates show that 86 percent of children in primary education are now effectively out-of-school in countries with low human development—compared with just 20 percent in countries with very high human development. “But with more equitable Internet access, - where countries close the gap with leaders in their development group, something feasible – the current gaps in education could close.”

Similarly, it stresses that determined, equity-focused interventions can help economies and societies rally, mitigating the far-reaching impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“This crisis shows that if we fail to bring equity into the policy toolkit, many will fall further behind. This is particularly important for the ‘new necessities’ of the 21st century, such as access to the Internet, which is helping us to benefit from tele-education, tele-medicine, and to work from home,” says Pedro Conceição, Director of the Human Development Report Office at UNDP.

Implementing equity-focused approaches would be affordable. For instance, closing the gap in access to the Internet for low- and middle-income countries is estimated to cost just one per cent of the extraordinary fiscal support packages the world has so far committed to respond to COVID-19. The importance of equity is emphasized in the United Nations’ framework for the immediate socio-economic response to COVID-19 crisis, which sets out a green, gender-equal, good governance baseline from which to build a ‘new normal”. It recommends five priority steps to tackle the complexity of this crisis: 

• Protecting health systems and services. 
• Ramping up social protection. 
• Protecting jobs, small- and medium-sized businesses and informal sector workers.
• Making macroeconomic policies work for everyone. 
• Promoting peace, good governance and trust to build social cohesion. 

 

UNDP calls on the international community to rapidly invest in the ability of developing countries to follow these steps.