Lebanon’s HDI value for 2017 is 0.757— which put the country in the high human development category—positioning it at 80 out of 189 countries and territories. The rank is shared with Azerbaijan and The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia. Between 2005 and 2017, Lebanon’s HDI value increased from 0.732 to 0.757, an increase of 3.4 percent. Table A reviews Lebanon’s progress in each of the HDI indicators. Between 1990 and 2017, Lebanon’s life expectancy at birth increased by 9.6 years, mean years of schooling increased by 1.2 years and expected years of schooling increased by 0.8 years. Lebanon’s GNI per capita increased by about 49.1 percent between 1990 and 2017.
Figure 1: Trends in Lebanon’s HDI component indices 2005-2017
Assessing progress relative to other countries The human development progress, as measured by the HDI, can usefully be compared to other countries. For instance, during the period between 2005 and 2017 Lebanon, Jordan and Libya experienced different degrees of progress toward increasing their HDIs (see figure 2).
Lebanon’s 2017 HDI of 0.757 is the same as the average of 0.757 for countries in the high human development group and above the average of 0.699 for countries in Arab States. From Arab States, countries which are close to Lebanon in 2017 HDI rank and to some extent in population size are Jordan and Kuwait, which have HDIs ranked 95 and 56 respectively (see table B).
Inequality-adjusted HDI (IHDI)
The HDI is an average measure of basic human development achievements in a country. Like all averages, the HDI masks inequality in the distribution of human development across the population at the country level. The 2010 HDR introduced the IHDI, which takes into account inequality in all three dimensions of the HDI by ‘discounting’ each dimension’s average value according to its level of inequality. The IHDI is basically the HDI discounted for inequalities. The ‘loss’ in human development due to inequality is given by the difference between the HDI and the IHDI, and can be expressed as a percentage. As the inequality in a country increases, the loss in human development also increases. We also present the coefficient of human inequality as a direct measure of inequality which is an unweighted average of inequalities in three dimensions. The IHDI is calculated for 151 countries. For more details see Technical Note 2. Due to a lack of relevant data, the IHDI has not been calculated for this country.
Gender Development Index (GDI)
In the 2014 HDR, HDRO introduced a new measure, the GDI, based on the sex-disaggregated Human Development Index, defined as a ratio of the female to the male HDI. The GDI measures gender inequalities in achievement in three basic dimensions of human development: health (measured by female and male life expectancy at birth), education (measured by female and male expected years of schooling for children and mean years for adults aged 25 years and older); and command over economic resources (measured by female and male estimated GNI per capita). For details on how the index is constructed refer to Technical Note 3. Country groups are based on absolute deviation from gender parity in HDI. This means that the grouping takes into consideration inequality in favour of men or women equally. The GDI is calculated for 164 countries. The 2017 female HDI value for Lebanon is 0.701 in contrast with 0.788 for males, resulting in a GDI value of 0.889, placing it into Group 5. In comparison, GDI values for Jordan and Kuwait are 0.857 and 0.990 respectively (see Table D).
Gender Inequality Index (GII)
The 2010 HDR introduced the GII, which reflects gender-based inequalities in three dimensions – reproductive health, empowerment, and economic activity. Reproductive health is measured by maternal mortality and adolescent birth rates; empowerment is measured by the share of parliamentary seats held by women and attainment in secondary and higher education by each gender; and economic activity is measured by the labour market participation rate for women and men. The GII can be interpreted as the loss in human development due to inequality between female and male achievements in the three GII dimensions. For more details on GII please see Technical Note 4. Lebanon has a GII value of 0.381, ranking it 85 out of 160 countries in the 2017 index. In Lebanon, 3.1 percent of parliamentary seats are held by women, and 53.0 percent of adult women have reached at least a secondary level of education compared to 55.4 percent of their male counterparts. For every 100,000 live births, 15 women die from pregnancy related causes; and the adolescent birth rate is 11.8 births per 1,000 women of ages 15-19. Female participation in the labour market is 23.2 percent compared to 71.1 for men. In comparison, Jordan and Kuwait are ranked at 108 and 57 respectively on this index.
Dashboards 1-5
Countries are grouped partially by their performance in each indicator into three groups of approximately equal size (terciles), thus, there is the top third, the middle third and the bottom third. The intention is not to suggest the thresholds or target values for these indicators but to allow a crude assessment of country’s performance relative to others. Three-colour coding visualizes a partial grouping of countries by indicator. It can be seen as a simple visualization tool as it helps the users to immediately picture the country’s performance. A country that is in the top group performs better than at least two thirds of countries (i.e., it is among the top third performers); a country that is in the middle group performs better than at least one third but worse than at least one third (i.e., it is among the medium third performers); and a country that is in the bottom third performs worse than at least two thirds of countries (i.e., it is among the bottom third performers). Three-color coding visualizes a partial grouping of countries by indicator. More details about partial grouping in this table are given in Technical note 6.
Dashboard 1: Quality of human development
This dashboard contains a selection of 13 indicators associated with the quality of health, education and standard of living. The indicators on quality of health are lost health expectancy, number of physicians, and number of hospital beds. The indicators on quality of education are pupil-teacher ratio in primary schools; primary school teachers trained to teach; proportion of schools with access to the internet; and the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) scores in mathematics, reading and science. The indicators on quality of standard of living are the proportion of employed people engaged in vulnerable employment, the proportion of rural population with access to electricity, the proportion of population using improved drinking water sources and proportion of population using improved sanitation facilities. A country that is in the top third group on all indicators can be considered a country with the highest quality of human development. The dashboard shows that not all countries in the very high human development group have the highest quality of human development and that many countries in the low human development group are in the bottom third of all quality indicators in the table. Table F provides the number of indicators in which Lebanon performs: better than at least two thirds of countries (i.e., it is among the top third performers); better than at least one third but worse than at least one third (i.e., it is among the medium third performers); and worse than at least two thirds of countries (i.e., it is among the bottom third performers). Figures for Jordan and Kuwait are also shown in the table for comparison.
Dashboard 2: Life-course gender gap
This dashboard contains a selection of 12 key indicators that display gender gaps in choices and opportunities over the life course – childhood and youth, adulthood and older age. The indicators refer to education, labour market and work, political representation, time use and social protection. Three indicators are presented only for women and the rest are given in the form of female-to-male ratio. Countries are grouped partially by their performance in each indicator into three groups of approximately equal size (terciles). Sex ratio at birth is an exception – countries are grouped into two groups: the natural group (countries with a value of 1.04-1.07, inclusive) and the gender-biased group (countries with all other values). Deviations from the natural sex ratio at birth have implications for population replacement levels, suggest possible future social and economic problems and may indicate gender bias. Table G provides the number of indicators in which Lebanon performs: better than at least two thirds of countries (i.e., it is among the top third performers), better than at least one third but worse than at least one third (i.e., it is among the medium third performers), and worse than at least two thirds of countries (i.e., it is among the bottom third performers). Figures for Jordan and Kuwait are also shown in the table for comparison.
Dashboard 3: Women’s empowerment
This dashboard contains a selection of 13 woman-specific empowerment indicators that allows empowerment to be compared across three dimensions – reproductive health and family planning, violence against girls and women and socioeconomic empowerment. Three-color coding visualizes a partial grouping of countries by indicator. Most countries have at least one indicator in each tercile, which implies that women’s empowerment is unequal across indicators and countries. Table H provides the number of indicators in which Lebanon performs: better than at least two thirds of countries (i.e., it is among the top third performers), better than at least one third but worse than at least one third (i.e., it is among the medium third performers), and worse than at least two thirds of countries (i.e., it is among the bottom third performers). Figures for Jordan and Kuwait are also shown in the table for comparison.
Dashboard 4: Environmental sustainability
This dashboard contains a selection of 9 indicators that cover environmental sustainability and environmental threats. The environmental sustainability indicators present levels of or changes in energy consumption, carbon-dioxide emissions, change in forest area and fresh water withdrawals. The environmental threats indicators are mortality rates attributed to household and ambient air pollution and to unsafe water, sanitation and hygiene services, and the International Union for Conservation of Nature Red List Index value, which measures change in aggregate extinction risk across groups of species. The percentage of total land area under forest is not coloured because it is meant to provide context for the indicator on change in forest area. Table I provides the number of indicators in which Lebanon performs: better than at least two thirds of countries (i.e., it is among the top third performers), better than at least one third but worse than at least one third (i.e., it is among the medium third performers), and worse than at least two thirds of countries (i.e., it is among the bottom third performers). Figures for Jordan and Kuwait are also shown in the table for comparison.
Dashboard 5: Socioeconomic sustainability
This dashboard contains a selection of 10 indicators that cover economic and social sustainability. The economic sustainability indicators are adjusted net savings, total debt service, gross capital formation, skilled labour force, diversity of exports and expenditure on research and development. The social sustainability indicators are the ratio of the sum of education and health expenditure to military expenditure, changes in inequality of HDI distribution, and changes in gender and income inequality. Military expenditure is not coloured because it is meant to provide context for the indicator on education and health expenditure and it is not directly considered as an indicator of socioeconomic sustainability. Table J provides the number of indicators in which Lebanon performs: better than at least two thirds of countries (i.e., it is among the top third performers), better than at least one third but worse than at least one third (i.e., it is among the medium third performers), and worse than at least two thirds of countries (i.e., it is among the bottom third performers). Figures for Jordan and Kuwait are also shown in the table for comparison.
You must be logged in to post a comment.