Wednesday, 27 August 2008 01:00  |  Written by Steve Hall and posted in Environment

Have you heard about the Happy Planet Index (or HPI for short)?  I only found out about it today and even the name makes me smile!  Apparently the New Economics Foundation (NEF) in London has developed a new way of measuring a nation's economic success.

The Happy Planet Index takes into account a country's happiness* and average life span and divides it by its ecological impact to measure how much it spent in achieving its well-being...!!! 

Did you get that?  Sometimes it's just easier to skip the maths and head straight to the results...

So on this scale, in 2006, the Pacific archipelago nation of Vanatu was in first place, and Columbia was second.  Globally, the UK was 108th compared to Cuba at 6th, Indonesia at 23rd, China at 31st, Mexico at 38th, India at 62nd, Germany at 81st, the US at 150th and Russia at 178th.  Zimbabwe, plagued by poverty and political turmoil is currently the least efficient at producing happiness on Earth.

Within Europe, the HPI was re-calculated in 2007 using the size of each nation's carbon footprint within the maths.  This meant that the UK is only the 21st (out of 30) most efficient nation in Europe at producing happiness.  Iceland is first, Sweden is second and Norway is third.  The UK is the least happy of the major European nations with only transition economies, and Portugal, Greece, and Luxembourg doing worse.

According to the Happy Planet Index website , "the European Happy Planet Index reveals Europe is heading in the wrong direction, its carbon footprint still growing, and its level of carbon efficiency in terms of fuelling happy, long lives is lower than it was over 40 years ago."

To reverse Europe's decline in well-being more nations need to follow Iceland, whose "strong social policies and extensive use of renewable energy demonstrate that living within our environmental means doesn't mean sacrificing human well-being - in fact, it could even make us happier."

 

FOOTNOTE:
* Happiness is obviously somewhat subjective, but scientists have found measurable differences in people who describe themselves as happy.