Estonia is tied with Andorra for place 33 on the scoreboard of the United Nations human development index (HDI) 2013, one notch higher than last year when it placed 34th.
Estonia climbs one notch to 33rd on UN Human Development Index scoreboard
15th May 2013, 18:07
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The index for 2013 is based on data from 2012.
Place 33 among the 186 countries surveyed puts Estonia among countries with very high human development.
Of Estonia's Nordic neighbors Finland ranked 21st and Sweden seventh. Of the Baltic countries, Lithuania climbed two places to 41st and Latvia one place to 44th. Russia, in place 55, is ranked as a country with high human development.
The top three of the fresh rankings are Norway, Australia and the United States, the latter of which dropped one notch compared with a year ago.
The bottom places on the scoreboard belong to Niger, in 186, Democratic Republic of the Congo, 185, and Mozambique, 184.
The value of the HDI for Estonia in 2012 was 0.846, compared with 0.844 in 2011, 0.839 in 2010 and 0.837 in 2009. The latter is the only year when the index for Estonia declined compared with the preceding year, when it measured 0.842.
The life expectancy of Estonian residents at birth is 75 years, the study shows.
The UN human development index, published together with the UN Human Development Report since 1990, is based on life expectancy at birth, an education component and a wealth component.