New York - COVID-19 has exacted a terrible toll on lives and livelihoods around the world. But this is no passing phase. The pandemic is a window into a new reality – the Anthropocene - in which complexity and uncertainty are defining features.

Planned for release towards the end of the second quarter of 2022, the 2021/22 Human Development Report (HDR) will focus on these issues with a working title, “Uncertain Times, Unsettled Lives: Shaping our Future in a World in Transformation”. The report will explore how uncertainty in the Anthropocene is changing, what is driving it, what it means for human development and how we can thrive in spite of it.

“The Covid-19 pandemic and climate change are just two examples of new and dangerous planetary change, and the uncertainties they create are a hallmark of the Anthropocene,” says Pedro Conceição, Director of the Human Development Report Office at UNDP. “The new report will explore how changes like these are interacting with inequalities in human development to put our societies to the test.”

Continuing the thread of the 2019 and 2020 HDRs, the 2021/22 HDR carries forward a conversation centered on inequalities, while integrating other important themes related to uncertainties in the Anthropocene: societal-level transformations; mental health impacts; political polarization, but also, crucially, opportunity. The report will argue that, in the end, doubling down on human development is central to a more prosperous future for all.

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For regular updates on the 2021/22 HDR, please visit: http://hdr.undp.org/en/towards-hdr-2022