Traditionally, Australia tends to steal just about everything good that comes out of New Zealand and claim it for our own. Split Enz? They broke up, some of them moved here and restarted as Crowded House. Russell Crowe? Yep, got him as well, for better or worse. But it seems now that New Zealand might be about to take something of our own that we hold near and dear. For year’s we’ve always claimed the title of “The Lucky Country.” But new data on social progress indicates that it’s now New Zealand that offers far more opportunity.
The Social Progress Imperative has released a new study that ranks nations based on their progression in categories such as Basic Human Needs, Foundations of Wellbeing, and Opportunity. And with a runaway first in the world in Opportunity, along with strong showings in the other two categories, New Zealand leads the world in this new Social Progress Index. It’s not even a close victory over Australia either. Despite ranking 3rd in overall opportunity, poor showings in the other two categories places us 10th on the overall list, behind NZ, Switzerland, Iceland, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Canada, Finland and Denmark.
Though we’ve got one up on the Kiwis when it comes to Basic Human Needs, our real downfall is in the Foundations of Wellbeing, which includes indicating areas like Access to Basic Knowledge, Access to Information and Communications, Health and Wellness and Ecosystem Sustainability. The study reckons we’re really lagging in our relative Levels of Violent Crime, Press Freedom Index and Gender Parity in Secondary Education enrolment, among a few others. New Zealand was rated as having no areas that could be considered to be overall weaknesses.
All is not totally lost though, as we’ve still got daylight between us and other major countries like the United Kingdom (13th overall), the United States (16th) and France (20th).
So, yeah. Cop that, France.
Check out the whole thing over here. It’s an interesting read.
Photo: Johannes Eisele via Getty Images.
