World Hunger Facts
While every country in the world has the potential of growing enough food to feed itself, 54 nations currently do not produce enough food to feed their populations, nor can they afford to import the necessary commodities to make up the gap. Most of these countries are in sub-Saharan Africa.
One: In the Asian, African, and Latin American countries, well over 500 million people are living in what the World Bank has called "absolute poverty".
Two: Every year 15 million children die of hunger.
Three: Throughout the 1990’s, more than 100 million children died from illness and starvation.
Four: The World Health Organization estimates that one-third of the world is well-fed, one-third is under-fed, and one-third is starving. Since you entered this site, at least 200 people have died of starvation.
Five: One in twelve people worldwide is malnourished, including 160 million children under the age of 5.
Six: The Indian subcontinent has nearly half of the world's hungry. Africa and the rest of Asia together have approximately 40%, while the remainder of the world’s hungry are found in Latin America and elsewhere.
Seven: Nearly one in four people, 1.3 billion, live on less than $1 per day.
Eight: 3 billion people in the world today struggle to survive on US$2/day.
Nine: Half of all children under five in South Asia and one third of those in sub-Saharan Africa are malnourished.
Ten: Malnutrition is implicated in more than half of all child deaths worldwide - a proportion unmatched by any infectious disease since the Black Death.
Eleven: Every 3.6 seconds someone dies of hunger.
Twelve: It is estimated that some 800 million people in the world suffer from hunger and malnutrition, about 100 times as many as those who actually die from it each year.