National Human Development Report 2019: China

This Special Edition of the China National Human Development Report marks multiple anniversaries: the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China, the 40th anniversary of China’s Reform and Opening Up, the 40th anniversary of UNDP and UN’s presence in China as well as the 20th anniversary of the production of National Human Development Reports in China. China has made extraordinary strides in human development from its founding in 1949 and especially since the beginning of the Reform and Opening Up. China’s Human Development Index (HDI) value increased from 0.410 in 1978 to 0.752 in 2017. It is the only country to have moved from the low human development category to the high human development category since UNDP first began analyzing global HDI trends in 1990.