A/HRC/41/34/Add.1 8. Today, the economy largely relies on remittances from Kyrgyz migrants, including health-care personnel, who have left the country in search of work opportunities, particularly in the Russian Federation and Kazakhstan. In 2016, remittances accounted for 34.5 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP), 2 the highest proportion worldwide. Emigration has boosted domestic wages and reduced income poverty and income inequality, helping the country to make progress in achieving Millennium Development Goal 1 on eradicating extreme poverty, 3 the aim of which has continued in a strengthened form in Sustainable Development Goal 1, on ending poverty in all its forms everywhere. The percentage of individuals living below the poverty line dropped from 62.6 in 2000 to 31.7 in 2008. The percentage remained above 30 from 2008 until 2016, after which it fell to 25.4. Income inequality has also improved, with the Gini coefficient value falling from 0.54 in 1993 to 0.23 in 2015.4 9. The country has also made good progress in terms of its Human Development Index value, which rose from 0.618 in 1990 to 0.672 in 2017, placing Kyrgyzstan in the medium human development category. Between 1990 and 2017, life expectancy at birth increased (by 4.8 years), as did the number of years of schooling (by 2.3 years) and the expected years of schooling (by 1.4 years). 5 The two latter values are linked to Millennium Development Goal 2, on achieving universal primary education and Sustainable Development Goal 4, on ensuring inclusive and equitable quality education and promoting lifelong learning opportunities for all. 10. In 2015, the State was declared as having achieved Millennium Development Goal 4, on reducing mortality of children under 5 years of age. In recent years, Kyrgyzstan has paid special attention to the quality of care for children at first-level referral hospitals and introduced standards of care.6 The under-5 mortality rate fell by two thirds between 1990 and 2016 and the neonatal mortality rate was halved, falling from 24 to 12 deaths in the same period.7 11. With regard to maternal health in the context of Millennium Development Goal 5 and target 3.1 of Sustainable Development Goal 3, on ensuring healthy lives and promoting well-being for all at all ages, Kyrgyzstan is gradually reducing the maternal mortality ratio. According to data from United Nations bodies and the World Bank, the ratio has fluctuated, with 74 per 100,000 births in 2000, 85 in 2005, 84 in 2010 and 76 in 2016. 8 This slow improvement has not prevented the country from having one of the highest ratios of maternal mortality in the Eastern Europe and Central Asia region. 12. More work is needed to achieve Millennium Development Goal 6, on combating HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases. 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 4 World Bank, “Migration and remittances. Recent development and Outlook. Special topic: global compact on migration”, April 2017, p. 3. United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Kyrgyzstan, MDG Acceleration Framework: improving maternal health in the Kyrgyz Republic, November 2013, p. 14. OECD, 2018 Development Pathways, pp. 24 and 32. UNDP, “Human development indices and indicators. Briefing note for countries on the 2018 statistical update: Kyrgyzstan”, p. 2. A multi-country assessment of the realization of children’s rights in hospital care in 2012–2014, covering 11 Kyrgyz hospitals, revealed that Kyrgyzstan was the only State to have adopted, disseminated and implemented the Convention on the Rights of the Child. A second-round assessment showed an effective change in many of the gaps identified in the first round. See Fernandes Guerreiro et al., “Assessing and improving children’s rights in hospitals: case studies from Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Moldova”, Harvard Health and Human Rights Journal, vol. 18, No. 1 (June 2016). See www.unicef.org/kyrgyzstan/health-and-child-survival. World Health Organization (WHO), United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), World Bank and United Nations Population Division, Trends in Maternal Mortality: 1990 to 2015 (2015), p. 73. The Republican Medical Information Center estimates lower ratios.