Introduced by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in 1990, the Human Development Index (HDI) is a composite statistic of education, income and longevity indices, calculated in order to measure social and economic development within countries.^[1][2] It consists of a number between 0 and 1, comprising five tiers of human development—very low, low, medium, high, or very high—wherein the development is considered higher when closer to 1.^[3] According to the latest Human Development Report, published in 2015 and reflecting data from 2014, Brazil placed 75th among 188 countries with an HDI value of 0.755.^[4][5] The UNDP highlighted the "rapid advance" of Brazil in two decades, leaving a situation of low human development (0.590) in 1990, reaching medium development (0.669) in 2000 and, finally, achieving high human development (0.726) in 2010.^[6][7][8]

In order to bring a human development perspective to the national level, the UNDP also created, in 1998, the Human Development Atlas in Brazil, which calculates the HDI of all the Brazilian administrative divisions, based on data provided by the decennial censuses conducted by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE).^[9][10] Released in 2013, in partnership with the Institute of Applied Economic Research (IPEA) and the João Pinheiro Foundation (FJP), the latest edition of the Human Development Atlas in Brazil shows that the average HDI of the Brazilian federative units grew by 47.5% from 1991 to 2010.^[11][12]

Since the beginning of the statistical series in 1991, the Federal District, which contains the national capital—Brasília—, has the highest HDI among the 27 federative units of Brazil, being the only one to fall in the category of very high human development according to 2010 figures. It also topped every subindex composing the HDI, except for longevity, when, in 1991, it was surpassed by Santa Catarina. Meanwhile, Alagoas set out the lowest HDI since 2000, especially due to a poor performance in education. Tocantins put forward the fastest progress in HDI value (0.330) from 1991 to 2010, while Rio de Janeiro had the smallest increase (0.188). According to the UNDP report, the states of the North and Northeast regions have the lowest indicators, with most municipalities registering low or medium human development, while in the South, more than 65% of municipalities have achieved high human development. The South and Southeast regions and the Federal District have the highest indicators and human development indices. ^[13][14]

Human Development Atlas

The methodology used by the UNDP to measure the HDI of all 5,565 Brazilian municipalities and 27 federative units differs from that used for countries. Although it has the same three dimensions of the global HDI—education, income and longevity—it adapts the global methodology to the Brazilian context and the availability of national indicators.^[15] Therefore, a comparison between Brazilian federative units and countries is discouraged and the numbers cannot be used as a parameter. The global report uses mean years of schooling and expected years of schooling to evaluate education, while the local report utilizes schooling of the adult population and school flow of young people.^[15] In the case of income, while the global report uses GNI per capita (PPP USD), the local report makes use of the Municipal Income per capita (BRL).^[15] As for longevity, both use life expectancy at birth as indicator.^[15]

List of Brazilian federative units according to Human Development Index and its subindices of Education, Income and Longevity^{[16][17][18][19]}

		2021[16]				2010				2000				1991
Rank	Federative unit	HDI	E	I	L	HDI	E	I	L	HDI	E	I	L	HDI	E	I	L
1	Federal District	0.814	0.817	0.821	0.803	0.824	0.742	0.863	0.873	0.725	0.582	0.805	0.814	0.616	0.419	0.762	0.731
2	São Paulo	0.806	0.839	0.771	0.810	0.783	0.719	0.789	0.845	0.702	0.581	0.756	0.786	0.578	0.363	0.729	0.730
3	Santa Catarina	0.792	0.790	0.759	0.827	0.774	0.697	0.773	0.860	0.674	0.526	0.717	0.812	0.543	0.329	0.648	0.753
4	Minas Gerais	0.774	0.762	0.718	0.846	0.731	0.638	0.730	0.838	0.624	0.470	0.680	0.759	0.478	0.257	0.618	0.689
5	Rio Grande do Sul	0.771	0.750	0.767	0.797	0.761	0.675	0.782	0.835	0.664	0.530	0.745	0.740	0.573	0.392	0.696	0.690
	Espírito Santo		0.742	0.715	0.864	0.740	0.653	0.743	0.835	0.640	0.491	0.687	0.777	0.505	0.304	0.619	0.686
7	Paraná	0.769	0.780	0.744	0.785	0.746	0.642	0.769	0.840	0.664	0.505	0.720	0.804	0.542	0.328	0.667	0.729
8	Rio de Janeiro	0.762	0.758	0.759	0.769	0.749	0.668	0.757	0.830	0.650	0.522	0.704	0.747	0.507	0.298	0.644	0.679
9	Mato Grosso do Sul	0.742	0.741	0.733	0.751	0.729	0.629	0.740	0.833	0.613	0.445	0.687	0.752	0.488	0.259	0.641	0.699
10	Goiás	0.737	0.778	0.714	0.721	0.735	0.646	0.742	0.827	0.615	0.439	0.686	0.773	0.487	0.273	0.633	0.668
11	Mato Grosso	0.736	0.758	0.720	0.730	0.725	0.635	0.732	0.821	0.601	0.426	0.689	0.740	0.449	0.221	0.627	0.654
12	Ceará	0.734	0.766	0.658	0.784	0.682	0.615	0.651	0.793	0.541	0.377	0.588	0.713	0.405	0.204	0.532	0.613
13	Tocantins	0.731	0.732	0.684	0.779	0.699	0.624	0.690	0.793	0.525	0.348	0.605	0.688	0.369	0.155	0.549	0.589
14	Rio Grande do Norte	0.728	0.680	0.692	0.819	0.684	0.597	0.678	0.792	0.552	0.396	0.608	0.700	0.428	0.242	0.547	0.591
15	Pernambuco	0.719	0.721	0.647	0.797	0.673	0.574	0.673	0.789	0.544	0.372	0.615	0.705	0.440	0.232	0.569	0.617
16	Acre	0.710	0.692	0.655	0.788	0.663	0.559	0.671	0.777	0.517	0.325	0.612	0.694	0.402	0.176	0.574	0.645
17	Sergipe	0.702	0.684	0.662	0.764	0.665	0.560	0.672	0.781	0.518	0.343	0.596	0.678	0.413	0.211	0.552	0.581
18	Amazonas	0.700	0.720	0.641	0.744	0.674	0.561	0.677	0.805	0.515	0.324	0.608	0.692	0.430	0.204	0.605	0.645
	Rondônia		0.694	0.677	0.731	0.690	0.577	0.712	0.800	0.537	0.345	0.654	0.688	0.407	0.181	0.585	0.635
20	Roraima	0.699	0.673	0.680	0.745	0.707	0.628	0.695	0.809	0.598	0.457	0.652	0.717	0.459	0.240	0.643	0.628
21	Paraíba	0.698	0.669	0.653	0.779	0.658	0.555	0.656	0.783	0.506	0.331	0.582	0.672	0.382	0.191	0.515	0.565
22	Bahia	0.691	0.659	0.648	0.772	0.660	0.555	0.663	0.783	0.512	0.332	0.594	0.680	0.386	0.182	0.543	0.582
23	Piauí	0.690	0.698	0.649	0.726	0.646	0.547	0.635	0.777	0.484	0.301	0.556	0.676	0.362	0.164	0.488	0.595
	Pará		0.686	0.645	0.744	0.646	0.528	0.646	0.789	0.518	0.319	0.601	0.725	0.413	0.194	0.567	0.640
25	Amapá	0.688	0.647	0.648	0.778	0.708	0.629	0.694	0.813	0.577	0.424	0.638	0.711	0.472	0.254	0.620	0.668
26	Alagoas	0.684	0.679	0.630	0.748	0.631	0.520	0.641	0.755	0.471	0.282	0.574	0.647	0.370	0.174	0.527	0.552
27	Maranhão	0.676	0.716	0.603	0.715	0.639	0.562	0.612	0.757	0.476	0.312	0.531	0.649	0.357	0.173	0.478	0.551

Maps

1991

2000

2010

2021

Every region of Brazil has significantly increased its Human Development Index in the span of two decades, with no federative unit under low human development by 2010. South, Southeast and Central-West are the most advanced regions, while the North and Northeast still presented states with a medium human development.