JICA and the World Bank should put the poor first

A circus group performs during the Second Africa Climate Summit in Addis Ababa in September 2025. | REUTERS

Oct 19, 2026

The last 75 years have brought the greatest improvement of human welfare in history. But over the past decade, much of that progress has stalled. This happened at the same time that the rich world shifted its attention to climate change. This is not a coincidence and it has to change.

Consider extreme poverty, long defined as living on less than a dollar a day. In 1950, more than half of humanity was that poor. Today the share is 7.6%, the lowest ever recorded. Average schooling has almost tripled, from 3.2 years to nearly 9. Electricity access has soared. Problems remain, but the gains have been spectacular.

Now development has slowed to a crawl. After almost two centuries of declining poverty, the number of poor people hasn’t budged since 2016. Global progress is at its slowest pace since 1950, according to the World Bank.

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