The United Nations has reported that about 113 million Nigerians, representing 48.7 per cent of the country’s population of more than 200 million, face deprivation in health, education and living standards.
The figures were contained in the 2026 edition of the annual Multidimensional Poverty Index report released on Monday by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative.
According to the report, the average poor Nigerian experiences deprivation across 55 per cent of the indicators used to measure health, education and living standards, while 28.7 per cent are classified as severely poor.
The report also highlighted a reversal of earlier progress in reducing poverty, with millions more Nigerians experiencing multidimensional deprivation.
It noted that the proportion of Nigerians living in poverty fell from 42.3 per cent in 2013 to 33 per cent in 2021 before rising to 38.7 per cent in 2024.
“That is nearly 18 million more poor people: three-quarters from a higher rate, one quarter from population growth,” the report stated.
Poverty Highest in Rural Communities and Northern Nigeria
The report identified significant differences in poverty levels between rural and urban communities, with rural residents experiencing substantially higher deprivation.
It stated that 68.9 per cent of rural Nigerians are poor, compared with 24.8 per cent of people living in towns.
Severe poverty is also considerably more widespread in rural areas, affecting 45.1 per cent of residents compared with 9.3 per cent in urban communities.
According to the report, poverty is most pronounced in the North-West and North-East geopolitical zones.
The findings highlight the uneven distribution of poverty across the country, particularly between rural communities and urban centres.
Clean Cooking and Electricity Remain Major Challenges
The UN report identified access to clean cooking fuel and electricity as two of Nigeria’s most significant poverty-related challenges.
It found that 47.4 per cent of Nigerians are poor and deprived of clean cooking fuel, while 37.6 per cent are poor and lack access to electricity.
“These are gaps that policy knows how to close,” the report stated.
The findings point to essential household services as important areas for policy intervention in efforts to reduce multidimensional poverty.
Global Poverty Rises to 1.2 Billion
Beyond Nigeria, the 2026 report found that the number of people experiencing acute multidimensional poverty worldwide had risen to 1.2 billion.
The global figure represents an increase of 51.5 million people compared with the previous year’s total.
UNDP Administrator Alexander De Croo described the increase as a wake-up call for the international community.
“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,” he said in a press release.
More than half of the people living in acute poverty worldwide are children, according to the report.
However, the UNDP noted that population growth contributed to the increase in the total number of people affected. It also cautioned that new data were available for only 13 of the 108 developing countries covered by the report.
Despite the global increase, the report recorded progress in several countries. It said 33 nations had halved the proportion of their populations living in poverty, as measured by the index, over the past 15 years.
Six of those countries were in sub-Saharan Africa, while China and Vietnam were among the countries in Asia that recorded rapid progress.
The report was published by the UNDP and the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative as part of their annual assessment of overlapping forms of poverty worldwide.
