A UN global poverty index has risen for the first time since it was created in 2010, bringing the number of people it counts as affected to 1.2 billion. The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) said on Monday.
In the 2026 edition of its annual report, the UNDP and the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative research centre counted 51.5 million more people living in “acute” poverty than a year earlier. UNDP Administrator Alexander De Croo said the rise should be a “wake-up call for the world.”
Population growth drives the rise in poverty
More than half of those in acute poverty are children. UNDP said population growth was a major factor in the increase, and new data was available for only 13 of the 108 developing countries covered by the report.
De Croo said the people affected face overlapping hardships, including hunger, missed schooling and a lack of clean water or electricity, and called this situation unacceptable.
Mixed progress across Africa and Asia
The report paints a mixed picture. Some 33 nations have halved the share of their people living in poverty, as defined by the index, over the past 15 years, including six in sub-Saharan Africa. China and Vietnam were among the countries making the fastest progress, UNDP said.
According to the press release, Egypt, Nepal and Tajikistan saw both their poverty rate and the number of people experiencing multidimensional poverty decline significantly. In Angola and Zambia, the poverty rate also fell, but population growth more than offset this, so the number of people in poverty still rose.
Where the poorest live and how poverty is measured
As in the previous year, the report found that most of the world’s poorest people live in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia, particularly the Indian subcontinent, the most densely populated region on Earth. The index tracks indicators including inadequate housing, sanitation, electricity, cooking fuel, food and education.
