Bangladesh shows 'remarkable progress' against hunger since 2015

Bangladesh has shown "remarkable progress" since 2015 in combating hunger riding on the declining trend of undernourishment, child stunting, child mortality and child wasting, according to the Global Hunger Index (GHI) 2023.

Bangladesh ranked 81st out of the 125 countries in the 2023 edition of the index, released on 12 October, positioned above its neighbours Pakistan (102nd), India (111th), and Afghanistan (114th) in reducing hunger.

The report highlighted, "Despite the challenges facing the world and the stagnation in hunger levels at the global level in recent years, some countries—including Bangladesh, Chad, Djibouti, Lao PDR, Mozambique, Nepal, and Timor-Leste—have shown remarkable progress since 2015."

This year, Bangladesh's hunger level has been categorised as "moderate", as it achieved a GHI score of 19.0 points out of a 100-point severity of hunger scale.

Bangladesh had been categorised in the "serious" level of hunger in 2015, scoring 26.2.

This is the eighteenth annual publication of the GHI, jointly published by Concern Worldwide and Welthungerhilfe, to track the state of hunger worldwide and country by country and spotlights those regions and countries where action to address hunger is most urgently needed.

Based on the data from 2018-2022 of the four indicators – undernourishment, child stunting, child wasting, and child mortality – a GHI score is calculated on a 100-point scale reflecting the severity of hunger, where 0 is the best possible score (no hunger) and 100 is the worst.

The index defines undernourishment as the share of the population with insufficient caloric intake; child stunting as the share of children aged under-five who have low height for their age; child wasting as the share of children aged under-five who have low weight for their height; and child mortality as the share of children who die before their fifth birthday. 

Each country's GHI score is classified by five severity levels – low (9.9 or less), moderate (10.0-19.9), serious (20.0-34.9), alarming (35.0-49.9) and extremely alarming (50-100).

The report also mentioned that the results within this 2023 Global Hunger Index report supersede all previous GHI results. The 2000, 2008, and 2015 scores and indicator data contained within this report are currently the only data that can be used for valid comparisons of the GHI over time.

Bangladesh ahead of India, Pakistan

The index includes six South Asian countries where Sri Lanka (60th) tops the ranking, followed by Nepal (69th) and Bangladesh.

These three countries are in South Asia to be placed in the "moderate" severity level.

Afghanistan (114th), India (111th) and Pakistan (102nd) are the bottom three countries in South Asia. These countries' hunger levels are categorised as "serious".

There are 50 countries that have "low" levels of hunger, including Belarus, China, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates.

Meanwhile, nine countries in this year's report are experiencing "alarming" levels of hunger.   They are:  Burundi, Central Africa Republic, Democratic Republic of Congo, Lesotho, Madagascar, Niger, South Sudan, Somalia, and Yemen.

"Today's report spells out the scale of the impact which multiple crises – including the fallout from the Covid-19 pandemic, the Russia-Ukraine conflict and climate disasters – are having on some of the world's poorest people," said David Regan, chief executive of Concern Worldwide, one of the report's co-authors.