While the proportion of Jamaica’s population that is below the poverty line is officially 8.2 per cent, the percentage of Jamaicans in danger of falling into poverty is 17.7 per cent.

The statistics are contained in the 2023 edition of the Jamaica Survey of Living Conditions (JSLC), a joint annual publication of the Planning Institute of Jamaica and the Statistical Institute of Jamaica.

Those classified as being in poverty are unable to buy sufficient food and other basic goods and services, according to the survey. That number declined from 16.7 per cent in 2001 to 8.2 per cent.

In 2023, 2.7 per cent of the population was in extreme food poverty compared with 5.8 per cent in 2021. All three regions also showed declines in poverty relative to 2021: the Greater Kingston Metropolitan Area fell to three per cent from 10.4 per cent; Other Urban Centres fell to nine per cent from 15.5 per cent; and Rural Areas to 11.5 per cent from 22.1 per cent.

“The prevalence of poverty fell for all age groups. While children and youth continued to have higher rates of poverty than older persons, the decline brought the difference within a range of approximately 4.0 percentage points compared with 10.0 percentage points in 2021, indicating a more notable decrease among the young,” said the survey.

However, the JSLC notes that individuals whose consumption expenditure is within 10 per cent above the poverty line are considered vulnerable of entering into poverty in a subsequent period.

“The proportion that was vulnerable was 9.5 per cent, the largest observed since 2012. Being at risk of entering into poverty in subsequent periods is not only limited to those above the poverty line, but includes those already in poverty. Therefore, those at risk were 17.7 per cent compared with 19.0 per cent in 2021,” said the survey.

It noted that the depth and severity of poverty showed improvements relative to 2021, with a decline to 2.2 per cent and 0.010, respectively, from 4.4 per cent and 0.018, respectively.

Inequality also declined as measured by the consumption-based Gini coefficient at 0.3560 from 0.3991 in 2021. The Gini coefficient is a statistical measure of economic inequality, commonly used to analyse income or wealth distribution within a population.