Genuine Progress Indicator is a metric that takes a fuller account of the well-being of a nation, of which GDP or the size of the nation’s economy is only a part. GPI does this by incorporating environmental and social factors which are not measured by GDP.
The GPI separates the concept of societal progress from economic growth and it is used in ecological economics, “green” economics, sustainability and more inclusive types of economics. For example, it counts the pollution, which results from rapid economic growth and increase in GDP size, as a loss rather than a gain.
The GPI nets the positive and negative results of economic growth to examine whether or not it has benefited people overall.
The relationship between GDP and GPI mimics the relationship between the gross profit and net profit of a company. The net profit is the gross profit minus the costs incurred, while the GPI is the GDP (value of all goods and services produced) minus the environmental and social costs.
Here is a look at how some of the MENA countries fared on three key GPI parameters:
