Canada slips below the U.S, Australia and Belgium - UN

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For the first time in more than a decade Canada has slipped below the United States, Australia and Belgium as the world's best place to live, according to a United Nations quality of life report.

This year's Human Development Index, part of the U.N.'s Human Development Report 2003, ranks Canada as the 8th best country in the world in terms of living conditions. The ranking is based on 2001 data.

Last year Canada lost its stranglehold of nearly a decade on the top spot when it ranked third, behind Norway and Sweden.

Immediate reasons for the further drop in Canada's rankings are not explained in the report. However, certain figures, when compared with other nations, speak for themselves.

The report cited an overall drop in Canada's GDP when compared with American numbers. Canada's GDP per capita is also down.

In 2001, Canada reportedly had 186 doctors per 100,000 people. The U.S. had 276, Belgium 395 and Norway 413.

The report also shows the U.S. attracts significantly more people to work in research and development fields than Canada. Additional figures place Canadian unemployment rates in 2001 at 7.2 per cent, while the U.S. figure was 4.8 per cent and Norway's 3.5 per cent.

Youth unemployment in Canada was also higher than in the U.S. for the same period.

Critics of the rankings say the index lags years behind, telling more about where Canada has been than where it is going.

In 1992, the Human Development Index ranked Canada number 1 under Brian Mulroney's government. Since then, the Chrétien government has often used the ranking to boast that Canada is the best country in the world in which to live.

But yesterday, when asked about the new ranking, Stephen Hogue, the deputy director of communications in the Prime Minister's Office, told the Star's Les Whittington: "We don't have any comment on that."

Raw data can be found by directly clicking on the following link:

http://www.undp.org/hdr2003/pdf/hdr03_HDI.pdf