Last week, upon the recommendation of the UNESCO Institute for Statistics, UNDP issued an errata sheet correcting the statistical data for Jordan included in UNDP’s Human Development Report 2002. Through constructive meetings between UNDP, UNESCO, the Ministries of Education and Planning and the Department of Statistics, and after a careful review of all available data and methodologies, accurate data for Jordan was obtained which resulted in changing the ranking of Jordan in the HDR.
The new data includes revised estimates for the combined primary, secondary and tertiary gross enrolment ratio (GER) for Jordan for 1999, changing them from 55% as indicated in the HDR 2002 to 77%. The revised GER is based on consistent population estimate and enrolment data, which refer to the East Bank only. According to the new estimates, Jordan’s Human Development Index rank moved upward from 99 to 87 and its HDI value moved from 0.717 to 0.742 (Page 150, Table 1: Human development index). In addition, the net primary enrolment ratio for Jordan now reads 92% instead of 64% and the net secondary enrolment ratio reads 79% for 1998 instead of 60% (Page 183, Table 10: Literacy and enrolment).
The change in the ranking of Jordan is very important. Since first being published in 1990, UNDP’s global Human Development Reports have provided an overview of the level of human development globally. At the heart of the HDRs is the Human Development Index (HDI), an innovation from UNDP that moves the focus away from traditional income-based measures of human progress. Because it is based on universally measured variables (life expectancy at birth, income, and mean years of schooling), the HDI makes it possible to define human progress more reliably, and to measure it against experience worldwide.
The change in the ranking of Jordan is critical. It makes us focus on a significant dimension of human development. Namely, that there is no automatic link between the level of per capita income in a country and the level of its human development. The HDI and GNP per capita comparison for Jordan indicates that it does far better in its human development ranking than in its income ranking which shows that it directs its economic resources towards sectors promoting human progress.
In addition, the revision in the data may provide us with an opportunity to discuss what the measurement of human development represents in the key indicators. For instance, although the literacy figures are a reflection of access to education they cannot capture good quality education or the outputs of higher levels of education.
The debate regarding the discrepancies in education data for Jordan in the Human Development Report raises two important issues: given the impact and wide-reach of HDR, we have to make sure that the most up-to-date and most reliable data are included in the Report. Secondly, there is the pressing need for better coordination between national and international data agencies.
In this regard, UNDP and the Jordanian government have focused on supporting a project at the Department of Statistics to achieve comprehensive data coverage (funded by the Norwegian government). It is clear that deficiencies in social statistics can lead to a distorted view of a country’s progress/shortfall in actualizing human development. Thus, it emphasizes the importance of providing adequate comprehensive coverage of subject areas, representative, timely in terms of up-to-date, and of making statistics readily available in some comparable form but also reliable and to address the priorities of statistical gaps improved data collection.