Global Hunger Index by Country 2024

The Global Hunger Index (GHI) represents the degree of severity of hunger in a country. Hunger can include various definitions, including a lack of adequate calories and a deficiency in micronutrients, protein, or energy. Not having enough food to provide energy and nutrients for healthy growth can harm people of all ages in their functioning and development.

The GHI measurement uses four separate factors to calculate a country's index. The factors that go into calculating the GHI include the undernourishment value, child wasting value, child mortality value, and child stunting value. Due to the correlation between child growth and good nutrition over time, three of the four factors deal with child growth and health.

To calculate the GHI, these factors undergo standardization. This process divides the nation's reported values by the highest value for that standard on record.

The GHI uses a weighted average of these standardized factors to find the country's total index on a scale of 0 to 100. Low scores represent countries with lower levels of hunger in their populations. Nations that have higher scores have more severe hunger issues.

As of 2022, some of the nations with the highest scores lacked sufficient data to calculate their exact GHI. Consequently, the nation with the highest GHI of known value is Yemen at 45.1.

Other nations, such as Somalia, South Sudan, Burundi, and the Syrian Arab Republic have potential ranges that could place them higher than Yemen's GHI. These countries have only estimated ranges of 35 to 49.9 for their GHI values due to their hunger levels at "Alarming" status.

Overall the GHI values globally seem to have improved since 2000. That year, several nations had GHI values greater than 50, whereas, in 2022, no countries had such severe hunger statuses.

For the most recent set of data, several nations finished at the bottom of the GHI list with scores below 5. These countries include Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Chile, China, Croatia, Estonia, Hungary, Kuwait, Latvia, Lithuania, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Turkey, and Uruguay. Of these countries, Belarus, China, Croatia, Estonia, and Kuwait had GHI values below 5 for all four years of measurements, 2000, 2007, 2014, and 2022.

The Global Hunger Index provides insights into the severity of hunger and its impact on populations around the world. Changes in the GHI over time can indicate improving or worsening conditions for a nation.