The United Nations Development Program (UNDP) published a new report on July 14 in which it indicated that, between 2020 and 2023, 165 million more people have fallen below the poverty line. The UN stresses that the situation has escalated in recent years in the midst of crises such as the Covid-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine.
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The world today has 165 million more poor people than three years ago. Of these, 75 million are in extreme poverty. This is indicated by the UN in the report “The human cost of inaction: poverty, social protection and debt service (2020-2023)”.
The worrying picture means that more than 20% of the global population, around 1.65 billion citizens, currently live on less than $3.65 a day, struggling to get food on a daily basis.
And those in extreme poverty try to survive on an average of $2.15 a day, indicated the United Nations Development Program (UNDP).
The main cause of the vertiginous increase, says the report, has been the succession of crises. First was the Covid-19 pandemic that led to the halting of transportation, industry, and commerce activities, among others, which hit the most vulnerable the hardest.
Consequences that are repeated after the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, since February 2022. The conflict triggered financial sanctions against Moscow for ordering the war, including its oil industry. The Kremlin has also been accused of hindering the export of grains from Ukraine, one of the largest suppliers of this type of food in the world, situations that have influenced the triggering of inflation.
“Countries that have been able to invest in protection measures in recent years prevented many people from falling into poverty (…) But in highly indebted countries, there is a correlation between high levels of debt, insufficient social spending and an alarming increase in poverty rates,” UNDP administrator Achim Steiner said in a statement.
The UN asks to pause the debt of the least developed countries after the increase in poverty
In the midst of the consequences of the crises, increases in interest rates mean that the poorest nations now spend double or triple their income on debt service, compared to the richest. And about 2.3 times more in interest payments than in welfare.
“Particularly for low-income countries the debt burden has become unsustainable,” Steiner noted.
Among possible measures to tackle rising poverty, the United Nations urged world finance ministers to give poor countries “a pause” on debt repayments.
Steiner reiterated the call, noting that the situation is “alarming.”
“What this means is that a government can no longer pay its teachers, a government that can no longer employ doctors and nurses in hospitals, that can no longer provide medicines for rural health centers,” the official said.
The UN highlights that all of the additional 165 million people living in poverty are in low- and lower-middle-income countries.
G20 finance ministers, who meet in India next week, are scheduled to address the fight against poverty, along with reform of the world’s main multilateral institutions and the architecture of international debt.
With Reuters and EFE
