Background
Global efforts to eliminate poverty are stagnating, due to convergence of crises, including the rising cost of living, climate change, and ongoing conflicts. According to the latest ESCAP SDG Progress Report 2025, the Asia-Pacific region is off track in attaining SDG 1 overall, despite notable progress in eradicating extreme poverty (SDG 1.1) and reducing poverty by at least 50% in all its dimensions (SDG 1.2). The Pact for the Future recognizes that poverty in all forms and dimensions remains the greatest global challenge and that its eradication is an indispensable requirement for sustainable development.
From 1990 to 2024, the Asia-Pacific region experienced a decreasing trend in poverty at extreme and moderate poverty lines. Yet approximately 2.1 billion people in Asia and the Pacific continue to live on less than USD 6.85 per day, 876 million living on less than USD 3.65 and 219 million living on less than USD 2.15 per day. Recent upward revision of international poverty lines by the World Bank has also led to an increase in the headcount ratios across the region at extreme and moderate levels highlighting the scale of poverty in the region and underscores the urgent need for enhanced policy action. While most of the poor in Asia and the Pacific reside in South and South-West Asia, poverty is also high in several small island developing countries in the Pacific, especially at moderate poverty lines.
Poverty is not merely a monetary phenomenon. It has several dimensions that relate to non-monetary aspects of poverty such as health and nutrition, education and living standards should be used to inform policy decisions. According to the latest estimates, about 507 million people in Asia and the Pacific are poor when multiple dimensions are considered implying that 12 per cent of the regional population is in multidimensional poverty.
Irrespective of its measurement poverty is neither uniform nor static. In some countries, poor people are far below the poverty thresholds, while in others there are many just below or above the poverty line. As such poor people, as well as those close to the poverty line, are particularly exposed to risks including those induced by climate change, health or cost of living. For instance, ESCAP recently forecasted that around 266 million people could be pushed into poverty at national poverty lines by 2040 across the region in a pessimistic scenario of multi-hazard risks induced by climate change, lack of policy response to demographic transition, including ageing, and insufficient adaptation to digital technologies.
To eradicate poverty and enhance well-being while keeping the planet livable for all, policymakers must take action in several key areas. First, they need to support sustainable economic growth by providing decent work opportunities that provide fair incomes and productive employment opportunities for all individuals, and promote equality of opportunity for all individuals, regardless of gender, age, or socioeconomic background. Second, policies are needed that safeguard individuals both from climate-related shocks and risks as well as the impacts of climate mitigation and adaptation policies. Given the multiple dimensions of poverty, there are several policy areas including social, economic, trade, environment, energy and transport policies where inclusive and evidence-based policies must be complemented by regional collaboration.
Against this background, the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) is dedicating its upcoming flagship publication, Social Outlook for Asia and the Pacific 2026, to poverty eradication. ESCAP plays a key role supporting the achievement of global development goals by strengthening policy frameworks, fostering collaboration and exchange of knowledge and solutions in the Asia Pacific region, and considering its multi-disciplinary nature is well placed to address the multiple dimensions of poverty and support the development of inclusive and evidence-based policies in different policy domains. The Social Outlook is expected to (i) analyze the current status and trends of poverty emphasizing its monetary and non-monetary dimensions (ii) explore various factors that contribute to poverty including proximate and structure causes, (iii) highlight effective strategies and interventions in the context of social development policy that have been successful in reducing poverty in different and (iv) provide policy recommendations emphasizing the need for regional collaboration and integrated approaches to tackle poverty.
Objective
The objective of this Expert Group Meeting (EGM) is to identify and discuss approaches and good practices for inclusive social development policies that eradicate poverty across Asia and the Pacific. The ensuing discussions will feed into material prepared for ESCAP’s flagship publication entitled “Social Outlook for Asia and the Pacific: Eradicating Poverty, Empowering People” in 2026.
Organization and Participation
The EGM will draw participation from experts in academia, think-thanks, research institution, the United Nations system entities and governments. It will be organized online from 23 to 25 September 2025. The meeting will be attended virtually over Zoom. The EGM will be facilitated by ESCAP and include substantive presentations, plenary discussions and group work to elicit requisite information from all participants in support of drafting the 2026 Social Outlook. The EGM will be conducted in English.
The programme for each session is provided on the Programme tab.