Brasília contests UNDP data on education in HDI

Criado em 18/03/13 10h49 e atualizado em 25/03/13 12h30
Por Luciano Nascimento Edição:s Fonte:Agencia Brasil

Brasília – The Brazilian government says that there were methodology problems in the United Nations Development Programs's most recent Human Development Index report. In the 2012 HDI, Brazil ranked 85th out of 187 countries – the exact same position it had in the 2011 report.

Although the 2012 report highlighted Brazil as one of 15 countries that had most improved its IDH grade (Brazil's grade has risen 24% in two decades), minister of Education, Aloizio Mercadante complained that Brazil's rank could have been much higher if more up-to-date information had been factored in.

Ministers Mercandante and Tereza Campello (of Social Development and Hunger Combat) criticized the report's data on education in Brazil calling the numbers “unacceptably out-of-date.” According to Mercandante and Campello, the number for average years of schooling was 14.2, the same as in the 2000 report. “Since then, years in school (“escolaridade”) has risen to 16.7 years. If this number had been used, Brazil would have jumped 20 places in the HDI ranking.”

Mercandante also criticized the report for saying that only 26,000 children five years of age were in school. “Today, we have no less than 4.6 million children in this age group in school. We can inform UNDP the name and address of each and every school where they study,” said the minister. Another problem was an error with the percentage of Brazilians over the age of 25 and their years of schooling. The report, Mercandante pointed out, says this age group has an average 7.2 years in school, when the right number is 7.4.

Summing up, Mecandante said the UNDP's HDI simply did not take into consideration what has happened in Brazil since 2000. According to the minister, Brazil yanked an Argentina out of poverty [around 40 million people] and pulled them into the lower middle class. “We are going to discuss this with UNDP representatives. We will knock on the door over there and show them the data. They will have to do some revising,” declared the minister.

At a press conference, the UNDP representative in Brazil, Jorge Chediek, admitted that the numbers on Brazil in the latest report were out-of-date, explaining that the reason was the methodology used. “In order to keep the data in different countries in balance, sometimes we use older numbers.This method has limitations. Not all countries have been changing as fast as Brazil,” he declared.

Editors: Beto Coura / Nira Foster
Translation: Allen Bennett