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STOCKHOLM, March 21 (Xinhua) -- Millions of people are not benefiting from progress, with the gap set to widen unless deep-rooted development barriers, including discrimination and unequal political participation, are tackled, according to the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) report released on Tuesday.
The Human Development Report 2016, entitled "Human Development for Everyone", was released Tuesday in Stockholm by the UNDP.
It said, a quarter-century of impressive human development progress continues to leave many people behind, with systemic, often unmeasured, barriers to catching up.
A stronger focus on those excluded and on actions to dismantle these barriers is urgently needed to ensure sustainable human development for all.
The report finds that although average human development improved significantly across all regions from 1990 to 2015, one in three people worldwide continue to live in low levels of human development, as measured by the Human Development Index.
"Leaving no one behind needs to become the way we operate as a global community. In order to overcome the barriers that hamper both human development and progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals, inclusiveness must guide policy choices," said Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Lofven, speaking at the launch of the report on Tuesday.
"The world has come a long way in rolling back extreme poverty, in improving access to education, health and sanitation, and in expanding possibilities for women and girls," said Helen Clark, UNDP Administrator.
However, "those gains are a prelude to the next, possibly tougher challenge, to ensure the benefits of global progress reach everyone," said Clark.
The report shows that in almost every country, several groups face disadvantages that often overlap and reinforce each other, increasing vulnerability, widening the progress gap across generations, and making it harder to catch up as the world moves on.
In the case of women, the report notes that while global gender disparities are narrowing slowly, longstanding patters of exclusion and lack of empowerment for women and girls remain pressing challenges.
The Human Development Report is an editorially independent publication of the United Nations Development Program.
UNDP partners with people at all levels of society to help build nations that can withstand crisis, and drive and sustain the kind of growth that improves the quality of life for everyone.
