Highlights of the Report of the
1997 Philippine Human Develoment Index

Philippine Human Development Index (HDI) Up 1.7% in 1997

The Report on the 1997 Philippine Human Development Index (HDI) revealed that the Filipinos' quality of life has relatively improved in 1997.

During the year, the Philippines registered an HDI of 0.625, which is 1.7% higher than the 1994 index of 0.614.

The 1997 HDI results manifested the same trends as in the past. The provinces which have close proximities to Metro Manila attained higher HDIs while those that are geographically far from the capital of the country remained at the tail ends. Among the major island groups, Luzon posted the highest average HDI of 0.596, up from its 1994 index of 0.558. This was followed by the Visayas with a mean HDI of 0.531 and Mindanao with 0.490. On the other hand, the NCR was still way ahead of the country's provinces in terms of development as its HDI was recorded at 0.885 in 1997, an improvement from its 0.873 index in 1994.

Table 1 shows that majority (63 provinces or 81.8% of the total) of the provinces fell under the medium classification in 1997. This performance was an improvement from the 1994 HDI results when only 56 provinces or 73.7% attained medium classification. Bataan, which ranked eighth in 1994, surpassed all other provinces as it achieved the highest index for human development in 1997 of 0.723, up by 12.5% from its 1994 index of 0.643. On the other hand, 14 provinces (18.2% of the total) exhibited poor performance as they posted low HDIs. Sulu had the lowest HDI of 0.331 in 1997 from 0.347 in 1994.

Distribution of Provinces by Indices, 1997 and 1994

Note: The total number of provinces for 1997 is 77 since the province of Kalinga-Apayao was split into two provinces namely: Kalinga and Apayao in that year.

Source: National Statistical Coordination Board

In terms of life expectancy, almost all provinces (75 or 97.4% of the total) experienced medium development while two were classified under low. The number of provinces that fell under the 0.70-0.79 range in 1997 moved up to 21 from 10 in 1994. Folks in Pampanga are expected to live the longest as their province registered the highest life expectancy index. In contrast, the province of Tawi-Tawi had the lowest life expectancy index.

Meanwhile, provinces continued to manifest modest to rapid improvements in education in 1997. Two-thirds of all provinces (51 or 66.2% of the total) achieved high classification in education index in 1997 as against 39 provinces or 51.3% of the total in 1994. The remaining 26 provinces were classified under the medium range. Among all indicators considered in the estimation of HDI, education is the only indicator where provinces achieved high classification. Topping the list of provinces with high education index is Batangas, while Sulu posted the lowest education index.

While most of the provinces manifested medium or high development for life expectancy and education indices, only three provinces were able to attain medium classification in income index. All the rest (74) encountered difficulties in making both ends meet as they incurred low classification in income index. Batanes, Bataan and Cavite were the provinces that registered medium income indices. The lowest was again observed in Sulu.

Note: This report adopted the UNDP classification of human development, which is defined as follows:

High - if the province/country has an HDI of 0.80 to 1.0
Medium - if the province/country has an HDI of 0.50 to 0.79
Low - if the province/country has an HDI of 0.0 to 0.49.