India, word’s second most populous country, has reclaimed its position as the poverty capital of the world, after overtaking Nigeria in the latest ranking by the World Poverty Clock (WPC).
The World Poverty Clock, an online tool that monitors the progress against poverty globally and regionally and provides real-time poverty data across countries, blamed Covid-19 for pushing many back into poverty in the Asian country.
In 2018, Nigeria held the position with about 87 million people in extreme poverty, compared with India’s 73 million.
According to the new data, about 83 million Indians have been plunged into extreme poverty in 2022, representing 6 percent of the country’s population which stands at 1.3 billion.
For Nigeria, WPC said 70 million people are living in extreme poverty, representing 33 percent of Nigeria’s over 200 million people.
In 2020, the National Bureau Of Statistics (NBS) said more than 80 million Nigerians live in extreme poverty (on a dollar per day).