T&T ranks at 64 of 182 countries on UN's HDI index

Trinidad and Tobago ranks at number 64 on the 2009 Human Development Index (HDI) of 182 released Monday by the United National Development Program (UNDP).

The index provides a composite measure of three dimensions of human development: life expectancy, adult literacy and standard of living.

The survey puts Norway at number one followed by Australia and Norway. Canada is fourth and the United States is at 13.

Barbados is the lone Caribbean nation to make the top 40 list of the index, coming in at at 37. Several other Caribbean states were in the second grouping with Trinidad and Tobago: Antigua and Barbuda (47), Cuba (51), The Bahamas (52), Saint Kitts (62), St. Lucia (69), Dominica (73) and Grenada 74.

The Dominican Republic and St. Vincent and the Grenadines were 90 and 91 respectively with Suriname at 97 and Jamaica even lower at 100. Guyana came in at a low 114 while Haiti was the lowest for all Caribbean nations at 149.

The report said one in three Guyanese is emigrating.

Trinidad and Tobago's ranking for literacy was at 25, but it ranks at 104 for life expectancy of 69.2 years.

The Povery index has some interesting data for Trinidad and Tobago, with the overall ranking at number 27 among the 135 countriues surveyed for this section of the report.

It breaks down like this:

• People not using an improved water source - ranking: 49
• Children underweight for age - ranking: 38
• Adult illiteracy rate - ranking: 25
• Probability of not surviving to age 40 - ranking: 77

The report also shows that Trinidad and Tobago has an emigration rate of 20.2%. The major continent of destination for migrants from Trinidad and Tobago is North America with 81.4% of emigrants living in the U.S. and Canada.

It also says that there are 37,800 migrants in Trinidad and Tobago, which represents 2.9% of the total population.

Read the report
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