Global Hunger Rates Decline for Third Year as Regional Challenges Remain

That is measurable progress: the share of people facing hunger declined to 7.8%, from 8.1% in 2024 and 8.6% in 2022. But the UN agencies behind the SOFI 2026 report are equally clear: the recovery is slow, uneven and still off track for the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals.

The useful signal is not that the problem has been solved. It is that sustained improvement is possible—and that the next phase must be judged region by region, not from a single global average.

The global number is moving in the right direction

The report estimates that around 645 million people experienced hunger in 2025, nearly 14 million fewer than a year earlier and 43 million fewer than in 2022.

Broader food access indicators also improved. About 2.1 billion people—25.8% of the world’s population—experienced moderate or severe food insecurity in 2025. That measure captures households forced at times to compromise on food quality or quantity. It fell from 27.1% in 2024 and 28.7% in 2020.

Those are meaningful gains in a field where percentages represent millions of meals, purchasing decisions and supply systems. Still, the 2025 food-insecurity figure remains above pre-pandemic levels. The data describes a recovery, not a return to baseline.

Progress is concentrating where conditions allow it

Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean have recorded steady improvements, while Africa has become home to the largest number of people facing hunger in absolute terms: approximately 309 million, compared with 292 million in Asia.

Africa’s hunger rate did edge down, from 20.3% in 2024 to 20.0% in 2025. Yet rapid population growth changes the arithmetic: a lower share can coexist with a higher total number of people affected. More than half of Africa’s population, 56.6%, faced moderate or severe food insecurity, versus 20.3% in Asia, 22.9% in Latin America and the Caribbean, and 8.7% in Northern America and Europe.

The pattern reinforces a basic point about resilience. Aggregate growth can conceal sharply different local outcomes—much as French manufacturing activity returning to growth in June does not automatically describe every sector or region.

The 2030 outlook still depends on fragile inputs

The UN agencies project that roughly 510 million to 520 million people could still face hunger in 2030, compared with a 503 million lower projection in a pre-conflict scenario. The difference is tied to the duration of the Middle East conflict’s impact on food inflation, including higher energy and fertilizer prices.

The report also flags weather extremes, including El Niño effects in 2026 and 2027, alongside reduced development assistance and humanitarian funding. These factors are not abstract risks; they are the variables that can reverse a modest annual decline.

For now, the most credible optimistic reading is disciplined: global hunger has declined for three years running. The next test is whether that progress can be extended to the places where food access remains most constrained.