The United Nations Development Program (UNDP) in Vietnam on Friday launched the global 2021/22 Human Development Report (HDR), "Uncertain Times, Unsettled Lives: Shaping our Future in a Transforming World".  

The report said that unlike most developing countries, Viet Nam managed to sustain economic growth during the most difficult years of the pandemic. Although the average pace of growth slowed, and vulnerable groups and individuals suffered periods of real hardship, a major reversal of human development progress was avoided.

Viet Nam’s HDI value of 0.703 in 2021 was essentially unchanged from 2019 (0.704), and Viet Nam climbed two places in the global ranking from 117 out of 189 countries in 2019 to 115 out of 191 countries in 2021, according to the report.

UNDP also noted that Vietnam will face many challenges in the coming time and climate change is the biggest one. UNDP recommends that Vietnam increase investment in infrastructure, education, training and research to increase national resilience and capacity to adjust quickly and flexibly to changing global conditions.

The HDI combines gross national income per capita, life expectancy at birth and mean and expected years of schooling into a single index to provide a generalized measure of human development.

Vietnam has seen steady progress in all three dimensions of the HDI since the 1990s. The rate of increase in the HDI has slowed over the past decade, mainly because Viet Nam is now a richer country with relatively high levels of life expectancy and educational attainment for its level of income, said UNDP.