The Commitment to Development Index (CDI) 2025 provides key insights for both general readers and exam aspirants on how major global economies, including India, contribute to international development.
India’s Performance in CDI 2025: A Mixed Bag
According to the Centre for Global Development’s Commitment to Development Index (CDI) 2025, India ranks 36th overall among the countries evaluated.
This ranking is a result of a mixed performance across the eight policy components, with a single standout strength but several areas of significant concern.
Key Takeaways for General Readers & Exam Aspirants
| Indicator | India’s Rank (CDI 2025) | Significance/Context for CDI |
| Overall Rank | 36th | Important for general knowledge and ranking-based questions. CDI is a well-known global index. |
| Best Performance | Environment (8th) | Strength: India is among the top 10 performers globally, primarily due to very low emissions per capita. This score is often adjusted to account for per capita or economic size. The CDI’s environment component penalizes countries with high greenhouse gas emissions per head, which benefits India. |
| Worst Performance | Trade (38th) Finance (38th) | Weakness: Ranking last in both categories (out of 38 countries in the index). This signals the most room for improvement in areas related to aid generosity (Development Finance) and openness to trade (Trade). Low scores in Trade are often due to tariffs and subsidies that hinder imports from poorer countries. |
| Other Low Ranks | Investment (31st), Migration (36th), Security (31st) | These ranks (among the worst six countries) indicate policy weaknesses in areas like FDI openness, accepting migrants/refugees, and contributing to international security efforts. |
| Income-Adjusted Rank | 29th | Crucial for Analysis: This rank is higher than the overall rank. CDI calculates this by comparing a country’s development contributions to what is expected given its income level. India’s higher income-adjusted score suggests that when accounting for its low-income level, its commitment to development is better than what the raw rank suggests. |
Understanding the Commitment to Development Index (CDI)
For exam aspirants, understanding the index’s structure and top performers is vital.
1. What is CDI?
- Publisher: Centre for Global Development (a non-profit think tank based in Washington, DC, and London).
- Purpose: To evaluate a country’s overall commitment to development, emphasizing that it’s about more than just foreign aid. The index measures the quality and quantity of its policies that affect people in the developing world. The CDI typically ranks 40 of the world’s most powerful countries, including all G20 nations.
2. The Eight Policy Components (The Pillars of CDI)
The index uses a balanced scorecard approach across eight domains, which are often scaled relative to a country’s size or economic weight to ensure fair comparison:
- Development Finance: Quality and quantity of foreign aid (Official Development Assistance or ODA).
- Investment: Policies on Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), protecting investors, and avoiding capital controls.
- Migration: Openness to immigrants, refugees, and students from developing nations.
- Trade: Openness to imports from developing countries (tariffs, subsidies, especially on agriculture and fishing).
- Environment: Policies on climate change, fisheries, and biodiversity, including carbon pricing and fossil fuel subsidies.
- Health: Policies on sharing intellectual property for medicines, funding global health initiatives, and disease control.
- Security: Contributions to peacekeeping, arms control, and military interventions.
- Technology: Government support for R&D that benefits developing countries, and intellectual property policies.
3. Global Top Performers (Top 5 for Reference)
| Rank | Country | Key Strengths/Notes |
| 1st | Sweden | Retains the top position. Strongest in Environment (1st), Finance (2nd), and Health (4th). |
| 2nd | Germany | Ranks 1st in Development Finance and high in Trade. |
| 3rd | Norway | Ranks 1st in Health and 2nd in Security. |
| 4th | Finland | |
| 5th | United Kingdom |
Notable Trends:
- European Dominance: European countries mostly dominate the top 10 rankings.
- Largest Economies Lag: The world’s largest economies, the United States (28th) and China (34th), rank relatively low, indicating their policies are not as development-friendly as smaller, typically European, nations.
- Aid Cuts: The report notes a backdrop of major cuts to the provision of aid, which is a general negative trend impacting the CDI scores of many high-income countries.
Data Shows 34% Children Under Five Are S...
India’s Heritage Footfall Rankings 2024–...
Women, Peace and Security Index 2025/26:...
