It is perhaps as dismal a tale as it gets. As many people are stricken by poverty today as were 30 years ago, while in many parts of the world, more people are hungry now than there have ever been. That鈥檚 the message from two reports released independently of each other this week, from the World Bank and the non-profit International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
However, underlying even that bleak message is a more disconcerting one 鈥� that despite decades of trying, scientists and development groups still can鈥檛 agree on the true scale of global poverty and hunger.
Shaohua Chen and Martin Ravallion of the World Bank鈥檚 Development Research Group provide new estimates on the prevalence of absolute poverty around the world, defined as living on less than $1.08 a day. They found that between 1981 and 2004 the number of people living below this poverty line has declined from 1.47 billion in 1981 to less than 970 million in 2004 鈥� that is, from over 40 per cent to about 18 per cent of the population in low and middle-income countries. The figures, however, are less comforting than they seem, because the Chinese economic boom was responsible for most of this change. Take the east Asian giant out of accounts and the number of people living below the $1 line increased from 836 million to 841 million (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, ).
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The $1-a-day figure plays a key role in directing international aid and is also the parameter used to measure if countries are on track to achieve one of the UN鈥檚 鈥淢illennium Development Goals鈥� 鈥� that of halving the proportion of people living in absolute poverty by 2015. Yet the World Bank figures show that most regions of the world are lagging behind and that poverty is increasing in many regions (see Graphs).
鈥淧overty is increasing in many regions, yet the true global picture of poverty and hunger remains unclear鈥�
However, the true picture of global poverty is much less clear. 鈥淭he [World Bank] data is presented as if it was coming out of a laboratory,鈥� says David Hulme of the University of Manchester, UK. It is probably the best measure of poverty that we have at the moment, he says, 鈥渂ut there are still very large margins of error associated with it鈥�.
鈥淭here is not a clear and generally accepted criterion of poverty. What is being measured, and the techniques for estimating it, vary from author to author,鈥� says Robert Wade of the London School of Economics. The World Bank uses household surveys that ask people to recall how much money they have spent or earned in the preceding 30 days. Critics argue that respondents could be unwilling or unable to give accurate replies. A study conducted in India showed that shortening the recall period from 30 to seven days led people to report higher expenditures, and that the number of people below the $1 line could be half what is currently estimated.
On the other hand, many researchers argue that a much higher number of people are living in extreme poverty. They say the $1-a-day criterion is arbitrary and fallible, and suggest that poverty should be measured by how well people can satisfy basic needs such as food, water, clothing and housing. The Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean attempted this approach in 2001 by measuring daily calorific intake and other demographic parameters in Latin American countries. It concluded that extreme poverty rates in many countries were more than double what the World Bank suggested.
Focusing on people鈥檚 needs rather than abstract monetary measurements might be a clearer way to depict indigence. This week, IFPRI released its 2007 report in advance of , which falls on 16 October. It ranks developing and 鈥渢ransition鈥� countries according to a 鈥済lobal hunger index鈥� (GHI). This adds together the UN Food and Agriculture Organization鈥檚 (FAO) statistics on the proportion of people who are calorie-deficient, World 91色情片 Organization (WHO) measurements of underweight prevalence in children, and the UN children鈥檚 fund (UNICEF) estimations of the mortality rate of children under 5, giving equal weight to all three.
Starting with figures from 1981, IFPRI calculated each country鈥檚 GHI for six different years to find out which are on their way to achieving the Millennium Development Goals of halving the proportion of hungry people and reducing the infant mortality rate by two-thirds. Only two regions 鈥� Latin America and the Caribbean, and east Asia and the Pacific 鈥� are close to meeting the goals by 2015 (see Map).
The accuracy of the GHI is again open to challenge, however. 鈥淭his GHI is almost never referred to in the scientific literature, and that鈥檚 for good reasons,鈥� says in Sweden. He and other experts do not dispute the high quality of IFPRI鈥檚 researchers and the validity of their work, but they believe the WHO studies that directly measure people鈥檚 height and weight are the most reliable estimates of undernutrition.
If WHO figures are used instead of the GHI, the hunger map changes significantly. According to the GHI, south Asia and sub-Saharan Africa rank almost equally in 2007. However, the WHO data shows a higher prevalence of child undernutrition in south Asia. Sub-Saharan Africa, instead, has relatively high child mortality rates, which may well be down to poor medical provision and the high incidence of disease as well as malnutrition. Yet Doris Wiseman, an author of the report, maintains that the FAO, WHO and UNICEF all provided figures that capture 鈥渋mportant aspects of hunger, which is why we gave them equal consideration in the index鈥�.
The real value of such reports and indexes is to draw the public鈥檚 attention to the problem. And while it may take a long time before researchers agree on the precise extent of poverty and hunger on our planet, no one denies that they are serious plagues that need urgent intervention, says David Hulme. 鈥淧overty and hunger are very hard to measure. If we waited until we had good data before taking action, then our policies would be useless.鈥�
