55% of India’s population poor( (Multi-dimensional Poverty Index- Developed by the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative (OPHI) for the United Nations Development Programmes (UNDP))
1. About 645 million people or 55% of India’s population is poor as measured by this composite indicator made up of ten markers of education, health and standard of living achievement levels.
2. The new data also shows that even in states generally perceived as prosperous such as Haryana, Gujarat and Karnataka, more than 40% of the population is poor by the new composite measure, while Kerala is the only state in which the poor constitute less than 20%.
3. A person is defined as poor if he or she is deprived on at least 3 of the 10 indicators. By this definition, 55% of India was poor, close to double India’s much-criticised official poverty figure of 29%. Almost 20% of Indians are deprived on 6 of the 10 indicators.
4. Half of all children in India are under-nourished according to the National Family Health Survey III (2005-06). Close to 40% of those who are defined as poor are also nutritionally deprived.
5. A comparison of the state of Madhya Pradesh and the sub-Saharan nation of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), which have close to the same population and a similar MPI (0.389 and 0.393 respectively), shows that nutritional deprivation, arguably the most fundamental part of poverty, in MP far exceeds that in the DRC.Nutritional deprivation contributes to almost 20% of MP’s MPI and only 5% of the DRC’s MPI.
6. Multi-dimensional poverty is highest (81.4% poor) among Scheduled Tribes within India’s Hindu population, followed by Scheduled Castes (65.8%), Other Backward Class (58.3%) and finally the general population (33.3%).
7. Based on the MPI, Bihar has by far the most poor of any state in the country, with 81.4% of its population defined as poor, which is close to 12% more than the next worst state of Uttar Pradesh.
8. As per the Planning Commission’s figures, 41.4% of Bihar and 32.8% of UP is poor. In a possible indication of inadequate access to health and education facilities which do not show up in income poverty, almost 60% of north-east India and close to 50% of Jammu & Kashmir are poor as per the MPI, while the Planning Commission figures are around 16% and 5% respectively.
Report: http://www.ophi.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/Country-Brief-India.pdf
Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/55-of-Indias-population-poor-Report/articleshow/6169549.cms
Global Hunger Index 2010, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI)
1. India has been ranked 67, way below neighbouring countries like China and Pakistan. China is rated much ahead of India at the ninth place, while Pakistan is at the 52nd place.
2. Among other neighbouring countries, Sri Lanka was at the 39th position and Nepal ranked 56 by index. Bangladesh listed at the 68th position.
3. India is home to 42% of the world’s underweight children, while Pakistan has just 5%, it added.
4. The index rated 84 countries on the basis of three leading indicators — prevalence of child malnutrition, rate of child mortality, and the proportion of people who are calorie deficient.
Source: http://www.ifpri.org/publication/2010-global-hunger-index
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/India-ranks-below-China-Pak-in-global-hunger-index/articleshow/6728259.cms
http://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/TrackingHunger-statistics/trackinghunger/fullcoverage-FCLid.aspx
United Nations Millennium Development Goals report, 2010.
1. In 2005-2007, the proportion of undernourished people in South Asia had swelled to levels last seen in 1990.
2. The prevalence of hunger had increased from 20% in 2000-2002 to 21% in 2005-2007.
3. The regional average was 21% in 1990-92, indicating that no progress had been made in the last two decades in reducing hunger levels and that India — the dominant country in the region — will not be able to meet its millennium development goals.
4. According to UN figures, the employment to population ratio in South Asia fell to 56% in 2008 from 57% in 1998. The 2009 estimates put it even lower at 55%.
5. The proportion of employed people living under $1.25 a day jumped sharply from 44% in 2008 to 51% in 2009.
Report: http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/pdf/MDG%20Report%202010%20En%20r15%20-low%20res%2020100615%20-.pdf
Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Hunger-back-to-1990-levels-in-South-Asia-UN-report/articleshow/6080627.cms
Source: Hindustan Times
Hunger in India (United Nations World Food Programme (WFP)-2009 Report):
1. India ranks 94th in the Global Hunger Index of 119 countries.
2. India is failing its rural poor with 230 million people being undernourished — the highest for any country in the world.
3. Malnutrition accounts for nearly 50% of child deaths in India as every third adult (aged 15-49 years) is reported to be thin (BMI less than 18.5).
4. More than 27% of the world’s undernourished population lives in India while 43% of children (under 5 years) in the country are underweight.
5. More than 70% of children (under-5) suffer from anaemia and 80% of them don’t get vitamin supplements.
6. According to the report, the proportion of anaemic children has actually increased by 6% in the past six years with 11 out of 19 states having more than 80% of its children suffering from anaemia.
7. The proportion of stunted children (under-5) at 48% is again among the highest in the world. Every second child in the country is stunted, according to the health ministry’s figures.
8. Around 30% of babies in India are born underweight.
9. Almost 80% of rural households do not have access to toilets within their premises. The figure exceeds 90% in states like Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Orissa and MP.
Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/India-tops-world-hunger-chart/articleshow/4197047.cms
Hunger(Action Aid report 2009):
1. India, with 47 per cent of its children under the age of six malnourished, ranks below countries like Bangladesh and Nepal on the state of hunger.
2. 30 million more people have joined the ranks of the hungry since the mid-nineties. Whereas China cut hunger numbers by 58 million in ten years through strong state support for smallholder farmers.
3. On Hunger Index of developing countries, India ranked 22nd out 29 countries above Guinea Bissau, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Pakistan, Haiti, Burundi and Democratic Republic of Congo.
This index was developed keeping in mind country legal commitment to the right to food, their investment in agriculture and social protection, and their performance on hunger and child nutrition.
4. Brazil (Ranked 1st): within six years, the program Fome Zero (Zero Hunger) has introduced food banks, community kitchens and locally procured school meals along with simultaneous support for smallholder family farmers and
land reform settlers. The result: child malnutrition has fallen by 73 percent and child deaths by 45 percent.
5. China (Ranked 2nd): through heavy investment in supporting its poor farmers and a relatively equitable distribution of land, has reduced the number of undernourished people by 58 million between 1990 and 2001. Now less than 9 percent of the
population goes hungry.
6. Ghana (Ranked 3rd) has made food security a national priority and backed this with consistent support to smallholder farmers and democratic, stable governance.
Ghana has made remarkable strides in reducing hunger – especially for a low income country.
7. Vietnam (Ranked 4th) pursued equitable land reform and investment in smallholders, and with relatively strong social policies has made unprecedented progress, reducing poverty by half in the decade of the nineties, with comparatively low
levels of inequality.
8. Even Malawi (Ranked 5th), one of the poorest countries in the world, and burdened with a devastatinng HIV epidemic to boot – has reaped rich results within three short years. Through a massive boost of investment to small scale farmers, it has trebled production to halt a famine that threatened to leave nearly a third of its population hungry.
poor countries have made striking progress. On the other hand, some middle income countries have allowed rural misery to
deepen in the midst of growing wealth. Pakistan, for instance, is performing no better than desperately poor and conflict-torn countries such as Sierra Leone, despite having a per capita income over two and half times higher.India ranks
below Ethiopia and Cambodia.
Source: http://www.actionaid.org/docs/hungerfree_scorecards.pdf