Lao PDR Human Development and Multidimensional Poverty Indicators

The UNDP Human Development Reports Office (HDRO) maintains this dataset of human development and multidimensional poverty indicators for Lao PDR. It tracks progress across health, education, and standard of living dimensions using standardized metrics like the HDI and the 2019 Global Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI). The data is intended to facilitate policy discussions by comparing social outcomes against economic growth metrics like GNI per capita.

Use Cases

• Evaluating the correlation between GNI per capita and human development outcomes in Lao PDR
• Tracking progress toward SDG Target 1.2 by measuring the proportion of the population living in multidimensional poverty
• Analyzing normalized indices for health and education to identify specific development bottlenecks

Strengths

• Adheres to Principles governing international statistical activities for high data consistency
• Includes the 2019 Global MPI developed jointly by UNDP and the University of Oxford
• Provides geometric mean calculations of normalized indices for standardized international comparability

Limitations

• The 2019 MPI data reflects a historical snapshot that may not capture recent socioeconomic shifts
• Lack of explicit column definitions in the metadata requires manual inspection of the CSV structure

Provenance

Source

UNDP Human Development Reports Office (HDRO)

Collection Method

Statistical modeling and survey-based data collection

Time Range

Includes 2019 MPI data and updates through 2026

Freshness

Last updated March 2026 according to source metadata.

Geography

Lao People's Democratic Republic