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Nakinskie Robinson reports
Jamaica is losing ground in the high human development category, falling two places behind its previous placement.
This was revealed in the latest United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Human Development Report 2025, which analyzes development progress between 1990 and 2023 across a range of indicators known as the Human Development Index.
The HDI assesses long-term progress in three basic dimensions of human development: a long and healthy life, access to knowledge and a decent standard of living.
According to the report, Jamaica now ranks 117 out of 193 countries, down from its previous position at 115, despite a marginal improvement in the country's overall HDI value.
Under the HDI, countries are classified as having a low, medium, high or very high index.
Jamaica is the lowest ranked Caribbean country in the high development category, behind Belize, St. Lucia, Dominica, Cuba, Guyana and St. Vincent and the Grenadines.
Trinidad and Tobago and Barbados are ranked very high on the HDI index.
Of note is the life expectancy at birth for Jamaica, which has improved since COVID-19, but remains below pre-pandemic levels. Life expectancy remained the same for 2022 and 2023 at 71.48 years.
The data for 2019 shows that the life expectancy at birth was 71.53 years, while for 2018 it was 71.61 years.
The report says between 1990 and 2023, Jamaica's HDI value changed from 0.662 to 0.720, a change of 8.8 per cent. The improvement in the country's overall HDI comes as it makes gains in the gross national income per capita, which is the average income per person, which moved from US$9,813 to US$10,057 per year.
The gross national income per capita is based on the purchasing power parity, which represents the gross national income converted to US dollars using purchasing power parity rates.
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