Human development progress slows to a 35-year low: UNDP
The report shows how Artificial Intelligence (AI) could reignite development.
Instead of seeing sustained recovery following the period of exceptional crises of 2020-2021, the report reveals unexpectedly weak progress. Excluding those crisis years, the meagre rise in global human development projected in this year’s report is the smallest increase since 1990.
The 2025 HDR: “A matter of choice: people and possibilities in the age of AI” analyses development progress across a range of indicators known as the Human Development Index (HDI), which encompasses achievements in health and education, along with levels of income.
The report underscores growing divides between high- and low-HDI countries, reversing decades of gains. As global challenges, from economic shocks to climate pressures, narrow traditional development pathways, the report urges countries to act decisively and inclusively.
“For decades, we have been on track to reach a very high human development world by 2030, but this deceleration signals a very real threat to global progress,” said Achim Steiner, UNDP Administrator. “If 2024’s sluggish progress becomes ‘the new normal’, that 2030 milestone could slip by decades – making our world less secure, more divided, and more vulnerable to economic and ecological shocks.”
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