New York [US], October 13: The number of people living in "multidimensional" poverty has risen for the first time in 15 years, reaching 1.2 billion, as families struggle to meet their basic needs.
The finding comes in the 2026 update of the global Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) published by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and Oxford University, which measures overlapping hardship across health, education and standard of living.
The 1.2 billion figure represents 51.5 million more people than in the 2025 update. Of this number, more than half are children - 617 million - and 83% live in rural areas.
"The rise in poverty should be a wake-up call for the world," said UNDP Administrator Alexander De Croo.
"Behind these figures are 1.2 billion people facing hardships that reinforce one another: hunger, missed schooling and a lack of clean water or electricity. This is unacceptable."
The 2026 update - which covers 108 countries, representing some 78% of the global population - reveals that the increase in poverty is partly due to population growth outpacing efforts to improve living standards.
In 95 countries where no new survey data was available, updated population estimates increased the number of people counted as poor by nearly 16 million.
The remainder of the increase comes from 13 countries where data was gathered, reflecting the genuine change in poverty incidence and the associated demographic change, as well as differences in indicator coverage.
Source: Emirates News Agency
