TheHappy Planet Index (HPI) is anindex of humanwell-being andenvironmental impact that was introduced by theNew Economics Foundation in 2006. Each country's HPI value is a function of its averagesubjective life satisfaction,life expectancy at birth, andecological footprint per capita. The exact function is a little more complex, but conceptually it approximates multiplying life satisfaction and life expectancy and dividing that by the ecological footprint. The index is weighted to give progressively higher scores to nations with lower ecological footprints.
The index is designed to challenge well-established indices of countries' development, such as thegross domestic product (GDP) and theHuman Development Index (HDI), which are seen as not takingsustainability into account. In particular, GDP is seen as inappropriate, as the usual ultimate aim of most people is not to be rich, but to behappy and healthy.[1] Furthermore, it is believed that the notion ofsustainable development requires a measure of the environmental costs of pursuing those goals.[2]
Out of the 178 countries surveyed in 2006, the best scoring countries wereVanuatu,Colombia,Costa Rica,Dominica, andPanama.[3] In 2009,Costa Rica was the best scoring country among the 143 analyzed,[4] followed by theDominican Republic,Jamaica,Guatemala andVietnam.Tanzania,Botswana andZimbabwe were featured at the bottom of the list.[5]
For the 2012 ranking, 151 countries were compared, and the best scoring country for the second time in a row was Costa Rica, followed by Vietnam, Colombia,Belize andEl Salvador. The lowest ranking countries in 2012 were Botswana,Chad andQatar.[6][7] In 2016, out of 140 countries, Costa Rica topped the index for the third time in a row.[8] It was followed by Mexico, Colombia, Vanuatu and Vietnam.[9] At the bottom were Chad, Luxembourg and Togo. The latest update was published in 2021 by the Wellbeing Economy Alliance. According to that update, the top 10 ranking countries (in 2019) were Costa Rica, Vanuatu, Colombia,Switzerland,Ecuador, Panama, Jamaica, Guatemala,Honduras andUruguay.[10] The 2021 update also, for the first time, highlighted trends over time, noting for example improving Happy Planet Index scores inWestern Europe and inAfrica, but declining scores inSouth Asia.
The HPI is based on generalutilitarian principles – that most people want to live long and fulfilling lives, and the country which is doing the best is the one that allows its citizens to do so, whilst avoiding infringing on the opportunity of future people and people in other countries to do the same. In effect it operationalises theIUCN's (International Union for Conservation of Nature) call for a metric capable of measuring 'the production of human well-being (not necessarily material goods) per unit of extraction of or imposition upon nature'.[11] The IUCN is aninternational organization working in the field ofnature conservation and the sustainable use ofnatural resources. It measures what matters, a sustainable well-being for all.
Human well-being is conceptualized ashappy life expectancy.[12] Extraction of or imposition upon nature is evaluated by using theecological footprint per capita, which attempts to estimate the number of natural resources required to sustain a given country's lifestyle. A country with a large per capita ecological footprint uses more than its fair share of resources, both by drawing resources from other countries and also by causing permanent damage to the planet which will affect future generations.[13]
As such, the HPI isnot a measure of which are the happiest countries in the world. Countries with relatively high levels oflife satisfaction, as measured in surveys, are found from the very top (Colombia in 3rd place) to the very bottom (theUS in 108th place) of the rank order. The HPI is best conceived as a measure of theenvironmental efficiency of supporting well-being in a given country. Such efficiency could emerge in a country with a medium environmental impact (e.g.Costa Rica) and very high well-being, but it could also emerge in a country with only mediocre well-being, but very minimal environmental impact (e.g.Vietnam).
Much criticism of the index has been due to commentators incorrectly understanding it to be a measure of personalhappiness, when it is in fact a measure of the "happiness" of the planet. In other words, it is a measure of theecological efficiency at supporting well-being.[14][15] Furthermore, the Happy Planet Index was criticized because the used data is not comprehensive enough. In the HPI Report of 2006 (by nef) they emphasized that they"were forced to estimate data on Footprint and life satisfaction for several countries". Furthermore, they added that"there are obvious problems with the data from some countries, especially when it is collected and distributed by the country's government."[16]
Aside from that, criticism has focused on the following:
The index has been criticized for weighting the carbon footprint too heavily, to the point that theUS would have had to be universally happy and would have had to have a life expectancy of 439 years to equalVanuatu's score in the 2006 index.[17]
Nevertheless, the HPI and its components have been considered in political circles. The ecological footprint, championed by theWWF, is widely used by both local and national governments, as well as supranational organizations such as theEuropean Commission. The HPI itself was cited in 2007, in theBritish Conservative Party as a possible substitute forGDP.[18] A 2007 review of progress indicators produced by theEuropean Parliament[19] lists the following pros and cons to using the HPI as a measure of nationalprogress:
For the2019 ranking, 152 countries were compared and eight out of the ten top countries were located in Central and South America, despite high levels of poverty. The ranking was led by Costa Rica with an HPI score of 62.1, with its lead considered to be due to its very high life expectancy of 77 years.[20] Citizens of Costa Rica were found to experience well-being higher than many richer nations and the country had a per capita footprint less than one third the size of the US.[21] The second happiest country was Vanuatu. The highest rankingOECD country was Costa Rica,[22] in 1st place, and the top country in Europe is Switzerland, in 4th place, just behind Colombia in 3rd.[23]