Dual-island Caribbean nation, Trinidad and Tobago has been given a score of 0.60 (lower band 0.57, upper band 0.62) on the World Bank’s Human Capital Index (HCI).
The country ranges between 0 and 1 and is ahead of all the other countries of the Caribbean.
It should be noted that the Human Capital Index (HCI) database provides data at the country level for each of the components of the Human Capital Index as well as for the overall index, disaggregated by gender.
It was disclosed that the index measures the amount of human capital that a child born today can expect to attain by age 18, given the risks of poor health and poor education that prevail in the country where she lives.
It is designed to highlight how improvements in current health and education outcomes shape the productivity of the next generation of workers, assuming that children born today experience over the next 18 years the educational opportunities and health risks that children in this age range currently face.
According to reports, the rating is based on lower and upper bounds of the range of uncertainty around the value of the HCI for each economy.
Official reports had it that had there been ranks on the HCI, T&T would have been placed 67th, ahead of St. Lucia (68th), Antigua and Barbuda (73rd), St. Kitts and Nevis (77th), Grenada (87th), Dominica (95th) and Jamaica (97th).
It was noted that one of the reasons that the World Bank did not rank countries is because many countries were given the same HCI rankings – which can be imprecise. The bank explained this is why an upper band and lower band is given alongside the HCI value to cater for the uncertainty.
Delineating on the reason, it said for instance, both T&T and St. Lucia were given 0.60 (although T&T was placed before on the table). However, while T&T lower and upper bands were 0.57 and 0.62, respectively, St. Lucia’s lower and upper bands amounted to 0.59 and 0.62, respectively.
The connotation of this is that when accounting for uncertainty, T&T’s HCI could go as low as 0.57 while St. Lucia could go as low as 0.59 and both of the countries can be given a HCI value of 0.62.
Therefore, it can be said that with T&T receiving a 0.60 HCI value, that if a child is born today in the country, he/she will not be able to maximize 0.40 (or 40 percent) of their human capital potential.
It would be recalled that over the past decade, the World Bank indicated that many countries have made important progress in improving human capital. But, in the recent revelation, stated that the COVID-19 pandemic threatens to reverse many of those gains.
The World’s apex Bank stated that urgent action is needed to protect hard-won advances in human capital, particularly among the poor vulnerable.
It succinctly averred that designing the needed interventions, targeting them to achieve the highest effectiveness, and navigating difficult trade-offs in times of reduced fiscal space, makes investing in better measurement of human capital more important than ever.
Also, the World Bank indicated that “bold policies can drive a resilient recovery from the pandemic and open a future in which rising generations will be able to develop their full potential and use it to tackle the vast challenges that still lie ahead for countries and the world: from ending poverty to preventing armed conflict to controlling climate change.”
