Mexico’s poor increased to 43.9% of population during pandemic, versus 41.9% in 2018

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Mexico added 3.8 million new poor in 2020 due to the crisis derived from the pandemic, raising the figure to 55.7 million people, against 51.9 million in 2018, revealed Thursday the National Council for the Evaluation of Social Development Policy (Coneval).

The percentage of the population living in poverty grew to 43.9% in 2020 versus the 41.9% proportion in 2018, according to the latest measurement by Coneval, the agency in charge of official poverty data in Mexico.

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The country also added 2.1 million people in extreme poverty for a total of 10.8 million. This represented a proportion of 8.5% of the population and an increase of 1.5 percentage points compared to 2018 when there were 8.7 million Mexicans in this situation.

Coneval’s measurement is based on the National Survey of Household Income and Expenditure (ENIGH) of the National Institute of Geography and Statistics (Inegi), which revealed last week that Mexican household income fell 5.8 % from 2018 to 2020.

In addition to 2.9 million cases and more than 242,000 deaths, the fourth-highest figure globally, the Covid-19 crisis caused a historic 8.2 % contraction in GDP in 2020.

INCOME POVERTY LINE

While the income poverty line measurement is based only on the economic indicator and the food and non-food basket value, Coneval’s general measurement is multidimensional and contemplates access to social services, food, and other non-monetary resources.

In this context, Coneval reported that the population below the income poverty line increased by 5.1 million people from 2018 to 2020, reaching 66.9 million Mexicans, 52.8% of the total.

Coneval also recorded an increase of 4.6 million people below the extreme income poverty line, totaling 21.9 million people, 17.2% of the total population.

In the multidimensional measurement, the agency reported that people with at least one social deprivation rose to 85.7 million people, increasing by 1.1 million. The most common deprivation was access to social security, which affected 52% of the population, 66.2 million people.

BY STATE AND DEMOGRAPHIC GROUP

Poverty increased in 19 of the country’s 32 states in the last two years, the institute warned.

The states with the highest proportion of poverty are Chiapas (75.5%), Guerrero (66.4%), Puebla (62.4%), and Oaxaca (61.7%), all in the center and south of the country.

The states with the lowest poverty rates were Baja California (22.5%), Nuevo León (24.3%), Chihuahua (25.3%), and Coahuila (25.6%), all northern border states.

Although poverty in the urban population grew from 36.8% to 40.1%, this situation decreased in the rural population, from 57.7% to 56.8%.

The percentage of children under 18 years of age living in poverty increased from 50.3% to 52.6%, while adults increased from 36.5% to 39.5%.

Both men and women experienced increases in poverty, as men went from 41.2% to 43.4%, while women went from 42.6% to the current 44.4%.

For the indigenous population, poverty increased from 75.8% to 76.6%, with 35.7% in extreme poverty.

In contrast, for non-indigenous speakers, poverty rose 0.5 percentage points to 34.7 %, with only 6.8 % in extreme poverty.