A new report has warned of a surge in severe lived poverty in Africa, reversing the gains from the past two decades. Large numbers of Africans are struggling to meet their most basic needs according to findings from surveys conducted by non-profit Afrobarometer across 39 African countries between October 2021 and June 2023.
Material deprivation has climbed to its highest average level of the past 25 years. Large number of people reported going without a cash income (81 per cent), medicine or medical care (66 per cent), and sufficient food (59 per cent), clean water (57 per cent), and cooking fuel (51 per cent) at least once during the previous year.
Overall, nine in 10 respondents reported facing at least one of these five forms of material deprivation.
This according to Robert Mattes, co-founder and senior adviser to Afrobarometer and co-author of the report with Rorisang Lekalake, senior analyst at Afrobarometer, is a serious wake up call.
Regionally, the report found that levels of severe lived poverty are more intense in Central African countries than in those in other parts of the continent.
On average, 35 per cent of citizens in the four Central African countries surveyed by Afrobarometer experienced severe deprivation, followed by 27 per cent of West and Southern Africans, 22 per cent of North Africans, and 18 per cent of East Africans.
Over the past decade, severe material deprivation has fallen in Liberia, Burkina Faso, Togo, Gabon, and Morocco while increasing sharply in Nigeria, Namibia, Mali, Zimbabwe, and South Africa.
Limited economic growth over the last decade that included declining commodity prices and foreign investments, rising domestic prices and reduced grain imports linked to climate change were some factors that economists attribute to the stagnation in economic growth.
Other factors included the COVID-19 epidemic and the Russian invasion of Ukraine. It is important to note that many of these events affected the countries in the analysis very unevenly.
The African continent witnessed two important political trends that had links with economic outcomes such as growth and poverty. The first one is democracy. Over the past decade Africa has experienced declining levels of political freedom and democratic space and even military coups.
The second political factor is corruption. Afrobarometer data revealed a massive increase in corruption at the grassroots over the past decade. This was measured as the change in the proportion of people who said they had to pay bribes to get an identity document from the government, to obtain services at a public school or a public health facility, or to get assistance from or avoid problems with the police.
The findings urged for targeted interventions to address economic stagnation, food insecurity and governance challenges and the need for policymakers to act swiftly to prevent further deterioration in living conditions.