total of 415 million people came out of poverty in India Within just 15 years from 2005/2006 to 2019/2021, the United Nations (UN) on 11 July highlighted the remarkable achievement of the world’s most populous country.
The latest update of the global Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) was released by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative (OPHI) at the University of Oxford.
It added that 25 countries, including India, have successfully halved their global MPI values within 15 years, showing that rapid progress is possible. These countries include Cambodia, China, Congo, Honduras, India, Indonesia, Morocco, Serbia, and Vietnam.
in April, India overtakes China to become the world’s most populous country According to United Nations data, with 142.86 crore people. “Notably, India saw a significant reduction in poverty, lifting 415 million people out of poverty within a period of just 15 years (2005.6-19.21),” the report said.
“The report shows that poverty reduction is possible. However, the lack of comprehensive data during the period of the COVID-19 pandemic poses challenges in assessing the immediate prospects,” it said.
In India, 415 million poor people moved out of poverty from 2005/2006 to 2019/2021, with the incidence falling from 55.1% in 2005/2006 to 16.4% in 2019/2021.
In 2005/2006, about 645 million people in India were in multidimensional poverty, with the number expected to drop to about 370 million in 2015/2016 and 230 million in 2019/2021.
The report noted that deprivation declined across all indicators in India and that “the poorest states and groups, including children and people from disadvantaged caste groups, made the fastest progress.” According to the report, the multidimensionally poor and deprived people under nutrition indicators in India decreased from 44.3% in 2005/2006 to 11.8% in 2019/2021 and the child mortality rate fell from 4.5% to 1.5%.
According to the report, “the poor and those without cooking fuel fell from 52.9% to 13.9% and those without sanitation fell from 50.4% in 2005/2006 to 11.3% in 2019/2021.”
In the drinking water indicator, the percentage of multidimensionally poor and deprived people fell from 16.4 to 2.7, electricity (29% to 2.1%) and housing from 44.9% to 13.6% during this period.
Countries with different incidence of poverty have also halved their global MPI value, the report said. While the 17 countries that did so had an incidence of less than 25% in the first period, India and Congo had an incidence above 50%.
India was among 19 countries that halved their global Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) value during one period – for India it was 2005/2006–2015/2016.
According to the 2023 release, out of 6.1 billion people in 110 countries, 1.1 billion (just over 18%) live in acute multidimensional poverty. Nearly five out of every six poor people live in sub-Saharan Africa (534 million) and South Asia (389 million).
Nearly two-thirds (730 million people) of all poor people live in middle-income countries, making action in these countries critical to reducing global poverty. Although low-income countries account for only 10% of the population included in the MPI, they are home to 35% of all poor people.
Half (566 million) of the MPI-poor people are children under the age of 18. The poverty rate among children is 27.7%, while it is 13.4% among adults. Poverty primarily affects rural areas, with 84% of all poor people living in rural areas. In all regions of the world, rural areas are poorer than urban areas.
Countries halved their MPIs over a short period of four to 12 years, demonstrating the feasibility of the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) target of halving poverty according to national definitions within 15 years.
“Thus, it is important to consider context-specific multidimensional poverty indices that reflect national definitions of poverty as the global MPI measures multidimensional poverty with the same methodology,” the report said.
However, the agencies said that despite these encouraging trends, a lack of post-pandemic data for most of the 110 countries covered by the global MPI limits understanding of the pandemic’s effects on poverty.
Pedro Conceicao, Director of the Human Development Report Office, said, “As we approach the mid-point of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, we can clearly see that before the pandemic there was steady progress in alleviating multidimensional poverty. “
“However, the negative effects of the pandemic in dimensions such as education are significant and may have long-term consequences. It is imperative that we intensify efforts to understand the most negatively affected dimensions, which can lead to stronger data for poverty reduction. Collection and policy efforts are needed to get back on track,” Mr. Conceicao said.
A press release issued by UNDP said that looking at some countries where data was fully collected in 2021 or 2022 – Mexico, Madagascar, Cambodia, Peru and Nigeria – the pace of poverty reduction has been sustained during the pandemic. Can
Cambodia, Peru and Nigeria have shown significant reductions in their recent times, raising hopes that progress is still possible. In Cambodia, the most encouraging of these, the incidence of poverty fell from 36.7% to 16.6%, and the number of poor people halved from 5.6 million to 2.8 million, all within 7.5 years, including the year of the epidemic (2014). -2021) are also included. /22).
However, the full effects on a global scale are yet to be measured, it said. With the renewed emphasis on data collection, “we need to broaden the picture to include the effects of the pandemic on children,” the press release said.
“In more than half of the countries covered, there was either no statistically significant reduction in child poverty or MPI values for children fell more slowly than for adults during at least one period. This suggests that Child poverty will continue to be a serious issue, especially with regard to school attendance and undernutrition,” it said.
Sabina Alkire, director of OPHI at the University of Oxford, said the lack of data on multidimensional poverty is difficult to understand, let alone justify.
“The world is battling a data flood and is gearing up for the next era of digital evolution. Yet we do not have a post-pandemic vision for the 1 billion out of 1.1 billion poor people,” Ms Alkire said.
“This problem is entirely solvable – data on multidimensional poverty is gathered faster than most people realize – requiring only 5% of the questions in the surveys we used. We call on funders and data scientists to make breakthroughs on poverty data to track – and prevent – the interconnected deprivations that poor people face in real time,” he added.
The global MPI monitors poverty reduction and informs policy, reflecting how people experience poverty in various aspects of their daily lives – from access to education and health to things like housing, drinking water, sanitation and electricity. to the standard of living.
As a poverty index, the MPI can be depicted as a stacked tower of interrelated deprivations experienced by poor individuals with the objective of addressing these deprivations.