Nigeria’s progress in reducing poverty has suffered a setback, with the country’s multidimensional poverty rate rising to 38.7 per cent in 2024 from 33 per cent in 2021, according to a new United Nations report.
The 2026 Global Multidimensional Poverty Index, released on Monday by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative (OPHI), estimates that an additional 17.9 million Nigerians experienced multidimensional poverty over the period.
The report puts the number of affected Nigerians at 90.1 million in 2024, up from 72.2 million in 2021.
Nigeria recorded the largest increase in the number of people living in multidimensional poverty among the five countries that experienced an increase over their latest measurement periods. The others were Afghanistan, the Central African Republic, Guinea and Kyrgyzstan.
The findings suggest that gains recorded in the preceding years have not been sustained.
What Multidimensional Poverty Means
Unlike income-based measures, which focus on how much people earn or spend, multidimensional poverty examines the different disadvantages people face in their daily lives.
The global index measures deprivation across three broad areas: health, education and living standards.
Its 10 indicators include nutrition, child mortality, years of schooling, school attendance, cooking fuel, sanitation, access to drinking water, electricity, housing and household assets.
Under the index, a person is classified as multidimensionally poor when their household experiences deprivation in at least one-third of the weighted indicators.
This means poverty can extend beyond a lack of money to include living without electricity, access to clean water, adequate sanitation or sufficient education.
The UNDP stressed that the figures are based on household survey data collected in different years. Nigeria’s latest estimate reflects conditions captured in 2024, not a direct measurement of poverty in 2026.
Nigeria’s Earlier Progress Reversed
The report traced Nigeria’s multidimensional poverty rate from 42.3 per cent in 2013 to 37.2 per cent in 2018 and 33 per cent in 2021, before it rose to 38.7 per cent in 2024
The country’s Multidimensional Poverty Index value, which combines the proportion of people affected with the intensity of their deprivation, also increased from 0.175 in 2021 to 0.208 in 2024.
The intensity of deprivation among affected Nigerians rose from 52.9 per cent to 53.6 per cent during the same period.
The number of people living in multidimensional poverty had fallen from 76.3 million in 2018 to 72.2 million in 2021, but climbed to 90.1 million in 2024.
The latest figures indicate that the country’s earlier gains in reducing overlapping forms of deprivation have been reversed.
Poverty Levels Vary Across Regions
The report also highlighted wide differences in multidimensional poverty across subnational regions, with incidence ranging from 3.7 per cent to 88.3 per cent.
It compared Yobe and Sokoto, two regions with similarly high Multidimensional Poverty Index values, to show that communities can experience different combinations of deprivation even when their overall poverty levels are comparable.
The report said such differences make it important for policymakers to examine the specific challenges facing communities rather than rely solely on national or regional averages.
Sub-Saharan Africa Bears The Heaviest Burden
Globally, an estimated 1.2 billion people across 108 countries live in acute multidimensional poverty, representing 18.9 per cent of the 6.3 billion people covered by the index.
Sub-Saharan Africa has the highest regional burden, with 616 million people, or 51.4 per cent of its population, living in multidimensional poverty.
South Asia follows, with 393 million people affected.
The report also found that poverty is disproportionately concentrated in rural communities. About 998 million people, or 83.3 per cent of the global multidimensionally poor population, live in rural areas, compared with 200 million in urban areas.
The incidence of poverty stands at 28.7 per cent in rural areas, against seven per cent in urban communities.
Children account for a particularly large share of those affected. An estimated 617 million people living in multidimensional poverty worldwide are under 18, representing 51.5 per cent of the total.
Globally, approximately one in every three children experiences multidimensional poverty, compared with one in seven adults.
In sub-Saharan Africa, 355 million children live in multidimensional poverty, accounting for 57.7 per cent of the region’s affected population.
Global Poverty Rises For The First Time Since 2010
The report said the global number of people living in multidimensional poverty increased by 51.5 million compared with the previous update, marking the first rise since the index was launched in 2010.
Of the 1.2 billion people affected, 534 million, or 44.6 per cent, experience severe multidimensional poverty, meaning they are deprived in at least half of the weighted indicators.
A further 952 million people are considered vulnerable to multidimensional poverty because they experience significant disadvantages across several indicators without meeting the threshold for classification as poor.
Despite the global increase, the report noted that progress remains possible. Among the 89 countries with comparable data over time, 33 have reduced their Multidimensional Poverty Index values by at least half in fewer than 15 years, including six countries in sub-Saharan Africa.
The findings underline the challenge facing countries working towards the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal of reducing by at least half, by 2030, the proportion of men, women and children living in poverty in all its dimensions.
