Opinions & Interviews

MINSK, 23 July (BelTA) – Belarus’ high standing (58^th out of 132 nations) in the Social Progress Index 2014 is attributed, first of all, to the efforts of Belarusians, Professor of the University of Innsbruck (Austria) Hans Koechler said in an interview with the Panorama program of the Belarus 1 TV channel on 22 July, BelTA has learnt.

Hans Koechler called Belarus a center of investment solutions and research projects. He believes that this is the reason why the country has enough qualified specialists to keep up with its upgrade effort. “Belarus possesses industrial capacities, unlike other countries of the region that lost their national industries. Industrial capacities allow Belarus to act as a full-fledged independent state. The high standing in the social development ranking is the achievement of Belarusians themselves,” the Austrian expert underlined.

As was informed earlier, Belarus has the best social development indicators in the CIS, which is acknowledged by many international experts and confirmed by domestic specialists. Yelena Bogdan, a department head at the Belarusian Healthcare Ministry, said that the country holds high positions in the rankings related to healthcare. In her words, Belarus was the only UN member state to prove the validity of the country’s infant mortality rate, which was also taken into consideration while compiling the Social Progress Index 2014.

According to the World Health Organization, 100% literacy in Belarus is another eloquent indicator. Only 14 countries of the world reached 100% literacy by 2012. Among them were Belarus, the Baltic states, Poland, Russia, Georgia, and Kazakhstan. Chairman of the Environmental Initiative association Yuri Solovyov noted that Belarus holds leading positions in Europe in terms of availability of water resources, forestry, and air quality; however, there are several key factors that have a negative impact on the country’s standings. First of all, this is the Chernobyl disaster.

Belarus is ranked 58^th out of 132 nations in the Social Progress Index 2014. Belarus is ranked higher than such post-Soviet states as Armenia (60^th), Ukraine (62^nd), Azerbaijan (73^rd), Russia (80^th), Moldova (81^st), Kazakhstan (86^th), Uzbekistan (92^nd), Kyrgyzstan (93^rd), and Tajikistan (95^th). The ranking takes into account such basic needs of a person as food, access to water, healthcare, and personal security. Apart from that, the ranking draws attention to the access to basic knowledge, information resources and communications, ecology.

The first ranking was published in Oxford (Great Britain) in 2013. It ranked 50 countries. This year the ranking includes 132 states.