21 May 2020, Thursday, 18:28 119

Social Policy Ministry Forecasts Increase In Level Of Poverty In Ukraine By 6.5 Percentage Points To 45% In 2020

Даша Зубкова

The Ministry of Social Policy forecasts an increase in the level of poverty in Ukraine by 6.5 percentage points to 45% in 2020 year over year.

The press service of the Ministry of Social Policy has said this in a statement, Ukrainian News Agency reports.

“According to the forecast of the M.V. Ptukha Institute of Demography and Social Research, by the end of 2019, the poverty level (according to the criterion of expenditures below the actual cost of living) is expected to be at 38.5%, which is by 4.7 percentage points lower than in 2018, and by the end of 2020, the poverty level will increase to 45%, which is by 6.5 percentage points higher than the value of 2019," the statement reads.

The statement emphasizes that, therefore, media reports about a sharp increase in poverty from 27.2% to 43.6% according to the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) are incorrect and need to be clarified.

It is noted that over the past 3 years, Ukraine has shown a confident way out of the crisis, and had real chances to achieve 2008 levels in terms of poverty.

Thus, the poverty level by the absolute criterion (expenditures below the actual cost of living) decreased from 58.6% in 2016 to 43.2% in 2018.

Monitoring of poverty indicators according to 9 months of 2019 also indicates a positive trend in reducing poverty in Ukraine.

However, the events of 2020 related to the COVID-19 pandemic made adjustments to the country's socio-economic development indicators.

As Ukrainian News Agency earlier reported, as of May 13, since the beginning of quarantine, 200,000 people received unemployed status.

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