About 4.5million Rwandans are gripped in poverty according to the 2026 Global Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI).
Rwanda a landlocked country of nearly 15million population has a national multidimensional poverty incidence of 30.5% with an intensity of 44.6% (giving a national MPI of 0.136), according to the National Institute of Statistics of Rwanda (NISR).
With these statistics, it means that 30.5% of the population experiences acute multidimensional poverty.
A comprehensive breakdown of poverty prevalence in Rwanda indicates that the Southern province has the highest number of Rwandans engulfed in poverty.
The National institute of Statistics records 35.2% prevalence in Southern province while the Eastern Province follows closely with 34.4%.
Poverty incidence in Rwanda’s Capital Kigali is recorded at 12.4% indicating the lowest in the country.
The Poverty Intensity in Rwanda stands at 44.6% – this is the average share of weighted indicators in which poor people are deprived.
Deprivations include: cooking fuel, 29.2% (highest deprivation rate), Housing Materials: 28.1%, Drinking Water: 17.4%, Health Insurance: 15.1%, School Attendance: 2.5% (lowest deprivation rate), and Sanitation: 4.1%.
Kenya
One in four Kenyans continues to experience multidimensional poverty performing better than the Sub-Saharan African average
Kenya’s multidimensional poverty rate stands at 25.4 per cent, equivalent to approximately 13.75 million people based on household survey data collected in 2022.
The latest available country profile by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative (OPHI) also identifies a further 26.4 per cent of Kenya’s population — approximately 14.33 million people in 2022 — as vulnerable to multidimensional poverty.
A further 7.5 per cent of Kenyans were classified as living in severe multidimensional poverty, meaning they experienced deprivation in at least half of the weighted indicators used to calculate the index.
The proportion of Kenyans experiencing multidimensional poverty remains above the global benchmark.
