News & Events - Press Releases

The United Nations Association in Canada and the UN Development Programme (UNDP) cordially invite you to take part in the Canadian launch of the Human Development Report 2004. This year's launch will take place on Thursday, July 15 at 9:30 a.m. at the International Development Research Centre (IDRC). The event will feature both the presentation of the Report and reactions in terms of specific issues and significant indicators.

The 15th edition of the annual Human Development Report, commissioned by the UNDP, continues to frame debates on the most pressing challenges - new and old - for enabling people to live full and creative lives. HDR 2004 presents inter alia, cutting edge multicultural approaches covering power-sharing, religious and secular states, language policy, legal pluralism and affirmative action.

More than two-thirds of countries have minority groups that make up more than 10% of their population, and nearly a billion people belong to groups subject to some form of exclusion. The 2004 Human Development Report argues that states must actively devise multicultural policies to prevent discrimination on cultural grounds-religious, ethnic and linguistic. The expansion of cultural freedoms, not suppression, is the only sustainable option to promote stability, democracy and human development within and across societies.

The Report debunks the myths that have been used to deny expansions of cultural freedoms, showing that diversity is not a threat to state unity, not the source of inevitable "clashes", not an obstacle to development. Instead, it is at the core of human development-the ability of people to choose who they are. The Report presents a path-breaking framework to examine issues at the forefront of the international policy agenda: migration, predatory extremism, customary law and cultural diversity.

The Human Development Report 2004 includes and updates the widely respected Human Development Index (HDI) that compares the relative levels of human development in 177 countries, and presents data tables on various aspects of human development. Canada has regularly stood at, or near the top of the HDI (8th in 2003).

Stéphane Vigié, Deputy Director for Donor Relations at UNDP's Bureau for Resources and Strategic Partnerships, will officially launch the 2004 Report. His presentation will be followed by comments by Mr. Ric Cameron, Senior Vice-President at the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) and by David Onyalo, National Director of Anti-Racism and Human Rights with the Canadian Labour Congress.

DATE: Thursday , 15 July, 2004

TIME: 9:30 a.m. to 11:00 a.m.

PLACE: IDRC Auditorium 250 Albert Street, 14th Floor

For more information please contact Joan Broughton, UNA-Canada's Public Information Officer at: (613) 232-5751 ext 230 (email joan@unac.org)

Note: Free copies of the Report will only be available for journalists - but copies can be ordered.