the number of poor depends on many factors including historic levels of income distribution, institutional constraints and policy choices.<sup>3</sup> As can be seen by reviewing Table 2, there was no simple relationship between the rate of growth and the rate of poverty reduction in the 1990s.

Between 1990 and 1999, the fastest growing region of the world was East Asia and the Pacific, where GDP per capita increased by two-thirds, increasing more than 6% annually. East Asia also experienced the greatest decline in poverty, from 27.6% to 14.2% - a nearly 50% decline. South Asia also posted strong growth in the 1990s, with GDP per capita rising by 3.6% per year on average (34% during the decade) and yet, the percentage of the population in extreme poverty fell more slowly, by 2% per year. In Eastern Europe, poverty increased sharply in the 1990s, growing by 9% per year, even though the average annual fall in GDP was lower, at 2.5%. SubSaharan Africa, with the highest proportion of people in extreme poverty, failed to grow in the 1990s and made virtually no inroads to move people out of poverty.

||**_Ta_**<br>|**_ble_**_2:Reduction_<br>|_sinPovertybyR _<br>|_egion1990-9_<br>|_9_<br>||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
||**(I)**<br>**Populationin**<br>**extremepoverty**<br>**1990(%)**|**(2)**<br>**Populationin**<br>**extremepoverty**<br>**1999****_(%)_**|**(3)**<br>**Population in**<br>**extremepoverty**<br>**1999(millions)**|**(4)**<br>**Averageannual**<br>**rateofchange**<br>**in poverty**<br>**1990-99(%)**|**(5)**<br>**Average annual**<br>**rateofchange**<br>**neededtoachieve**<br>**goal(%)**<br>**(1999-2015)**|**(6)**<br>**Averageannual**<br>**changein**<br>**GDPper capita**<br>**1990-99**|
|Alldeveloping<br>countries|**29.0**|**22.7**|**1,151**|**-2.7**|**-2.8**|**1.9**|
|EastAsiaandPacific|27.6|14.2|260|-7.4|-0.2|6.1|
|EuropeandCentral<br>Asia|1.6|3.6|17|9.0|-9.4|-2.5|
|LatinAmericanand<br>Caribbean|16.8|15.1|**77**|-1.2|-3.7|1.8|
|MiddleEastand<br>NorthAfrica|2.4|2.3|7|-0.5|-4.1|0.8|
|SouthAsia|44.0|36.9|490|-2.0|-3.2|3.6|
|Sub-SaharanAfrica|**47.7**|46.7|300|-0.2|-4.2|**-0.2**|

Source: World Bank As a comparison of columns 4 and 5 in Table 2 indicates, East Asia and the Pacific is the only region on a path to meet the income poverty target of reducing by half the number of people in extreme poverty by 2015 - a goal they have actually come close to meeting in one decade. The prospects for poverty being halved in the other regions are much less favourable. In the Middle East and North Africa and Sub-Saharan Africa, the rate of poverty reduction would have to increase many times over to meet the goal, going from an average annual reduction of 0.5% or less in the 1990s to more than 4% annually until 2015. In Latin America the rate would have to triple, from 1.2% to 3.7% annually. Eastern Europe and Central Asia would need to see a dramatic turnaround, from rapidly increasing poverty to a rapid decline - a rate of progress greater than that posted by East Asia in the 1990s. In South Asia the challenge is great due to the large numbers of very poor; despite progress in the 1990s, a 50% increase in the rate of poverty reduction is needed between 1999 and 2015 to meet the goal.

The first Millennium Development Goal pairs reductions in hunger with the income poverty target. Reducing hunger is a challenge of a similar magnitude to reducing poverty; the Food and 3See _World Developnment Report 2000/2001, Attacking Poverty,_ Chapter 3, "Growth, Inequality and Poverty".

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