<P> The World Happiness Report is an annual publication of the United Nations Sustainable Development Solutions Network which contains rankings of national happiness and analysis of the data from various perspectives . The World Happiness Report is edited by John F. Helliwell, Richard Layard and Jeffrey Sachs . The 2017 edition added three associate editors; Jan - Emmanuel De Neve, Haifang Huang, and Shun Wang . Authors of chapters include Richard Easterlin, Edward F. Diener, Martine Durand, Nicole Fortin, Jon Hall, Valerie Møller, and many others . </P> <P> In July 2011, the UN General Assembly adopted resolution 65 / 309 Happiness: Towards a Holistic Definition of Development inviting member countries to measure the happiness of their people and to use the data to help guide public policy . On April 2, 2012, this was followed by the first UN High Level Meeting called Wellbeing and Happiness: Defining a New Economic Paradigm, which was chaired by UN Secretary General Ban Ki - moon and Prime Minister Jigme Thinley of Bhutan, a nation that adopted gross national happiness instead of gross domestic product as their main development indicator . </P> <P> The first World Happiness Report was released on April 1, 2012 as a foundational text for the UN High Level Meeting: Well - being and Happiness: Defining a New Economic Paradigm, drawing international attention . The report outlined the state of world happiness, causes of happiness and misery, and policy implications highlighted by case studies . In 2013, the second World Happiness Report was issued, and since then has been issued on an annual basis with the exception of 2014 . The report primarily uses data from the Gallup World Poll . Each annual report is available to the public to download on the World Happiness Report website . </P> <P> In the reports, experts in fields including economics, psychology, survey analysis, and national statistics, describe how measurements of well - being can be used effectively to assess the progress of nations, and other topics . Each report is organized by chapters that delve deeper into issues relating to happiness, including mental illness, the objective benefits of happiness, the importance of ethics, policy implications, and links with the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development's (OECD) approach to measuring subjective well - being and other international and national efforts . </P>

When was the first world happiness report released