Global hunger decreased in 2025 for the third consecutive year, but progress is too slow to meet sustainable development goals by 2030, warns the new edition of the State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World (SOFI) report published by five United Nations agencies.
According to the report, hunger affected 7.8 per cent of the world's population, or around 645 million people, in 2025. This is nearly 14 million fewer than in 2024 and 43 million fewer than in 2022, when 8.6 per cent of the population went hungry.
Progress, however, is uneven. While Asia and Latin America and the Caribbean record stable improvements, Africa has become the continent with the most hungry people: in 2025, 309 million people there did not have enough food, compared with 292 million in Asia. The share of hungry people in Africa fell slightly, from 20.3 to 20 per cent, but due to the continent's rapid population growth, it now leads the world in absolute numbers.
Around 2.1 billion people, slightly more than a quarter of humanity, experienced moderate or severe food insecurity last year. In Africa, more than half of the population, 56.6 per cent, lived in such conditions, while the share in North America and Europe dropped to 8.7 per cent.
UN agencies warn that conflict in the Middle East, extreme weather events, and cuts to development and humanitarian aid could undermine progress. Máximo Torero, chief economist at the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), stated that the crisis around the Strait of Hormuz would affect food production and yields. "We simulate that between 510 and 520 million people could still be facing hunger by 2030," he noted, depending on the duration of pressure on energy and fertiliser prices. The potential effects of the El Niño climate pattern in 2026 and 2027 are not included in the projections.
The report also notes that healthy diets are becoming more expensive: the average global cost rose in 2025 to $4.28 per person per day, up from $2.94 in 2017. The number of people who cannot afford a healthy diet has, however, fallen from 2.97 billion in 2021 to 2.69 billion, yet in Africa 66.6 per cent of the population cannot afford it, more than double the levels in Asia and Latin America.
