Poverty in Ukraine spiked after the

Dissolution of the Soviet Union The Soviet Union was formally dissolved as a sovereign state and subject of international law on 26 December 1991 by Declaration No. 142-N of the Soviet of the Republics of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union. Declaration No. 142-Н of ...

and then substantially declined, before flattening in the twenty-first century. A large percentage of

Romani people {{Infobox ethnic group , group = Romani people , image = , image_caption = , flag = Roma flag.svg , flag_caption = Romani flag created in 1933 and accepted at the 1971 World Romani Congress , po ...

in Ukraine live in poverty.

History

In 2003, expectations of a poor grain harvest, led prices for staple food products to jump in the late spring. The initial reaction of the government was to control prices by restricting producer profitability and retail mark-ups. In some oblasts direct government intervention was replaced by money transfers to vulnerable groups.Institute for economic research and policy consulting in Ukraine. German advisory group on economic reform From 2008 to 2013, the level of poverty in Ukraine increased or decreased slightly. Its maximum value was 25.8% in 2011. Poverty increased sharply after the annexation of Crimea and the start of the

war in Donbas The war in Donbas, or the Donbas war, was a phase of the Russo-Ukrainian War in the eastern Donbas region of Ukraine. The war Timeline of the war in Donbas (2014), began in April 2014, when Russian separatist forces in Ukraine, Russian para ...

. In 2014, the poverty rate was 28.6%, and the following year it doubled to 58.3%. In 2016, the poverty rate reached 58.6%. After peaking in 2015–2016, it began to decline: 2017 - 47.3%, 2018 - 43.2%; 2019 - 37.8%. In 2018, 1.3% of the population was extremely poor, defined as living on less than $5 a day. The majority of the population can meet basic needs. However, they do not have extra income. Rich people make up about 5%.

Effects of COVID-19

The M.V. Ptukha Institute of Demography and Social Research of the National Academy of Sciences ("Institute") published a study on the impact of

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2. In January 2020, the disease spread worldwide, resulting in the COVID-19 pandemic. The symptoms of COVID‑19 can vary but often include fever ...

on poverty. According to its results, by the end of 2020, 45% of the population of Ukraine fell into the poor category. The study claimed that this was 6.5 percentage points higher than in 2019. A pre-COVID-19 study forecast the poverty rate in 2020 to be 31.2%. The study stated that the real increase in poverty was 13.8 percentage points. The study predicted that close to half of Ukrainians would experience poverty in 2020 - 2021. The study defines poverty as income below the minimum subsistence level, which varied between an average of ₴3,237 and ₴3,636 ($115–130) per person in 2019. The "minimum subsistence level" is much higher than the legally defined average of ₴2,118 ($75), as established in June. The study pointed to pandemic as reversing recent trends of stable or declining poverty. According to the study, 60% of respondents said they had financial losses – 38% had a decline in regular income, 16% lost income entirely and 14% lost their jobs. The results reflect May findings by the Ministry of Social Policy, which estimated that the poverty rate had increased to 45% in 2020.

2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine

The start of the

2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine On 24 February 2022, , starting the largest and deadliest war in Europe since World War II, in a major escalation of the Russo-Ukrainian War, conflict between the two countries which began in 2014. The fighting has caused hundreds of thou ...

has triggered a major

humanitarian crisis A humanitarian crisis (or sometimes humanitarian disaster) is defined as a singular event or a series of events that are threatening in terms of health, safety or well-being of a community or large group of people. It may be an internal or exter ...

in Ukraine: according to the

United Nations Development Programme The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) is a United Nations agency tasked with helping countries eliminate poverty and achieve sustainable economic growth and human development. The UNDP emphasizes on developing local capacity towar ...

, a prolonged conflict will cause 30% of the Ukrainian population to fall below the poverty line, while a further 62% would be at risk of also falling into poverty within a year. The

International Monetary Fund The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is a major financial agency of the United Nations, and an international financial institution funded by 191 member countries, with headquarters in Washington, D.C. It is regarded as the global lender of las ...

predicted that Ukraine's

gross domestic product Gross domestic product (GDP) is a monetary measure of the total market value of all the final goods and services produced and rendered in a specific time period by a country or countries. GDP is often used to measure the economic performanc ...

(GDP) will suffer a decrease from a minimum of 10% to a maximum of 35%; the

European Bank for Reconstruction and Development The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, shortened to EBRD ( French: ''Banque européenne pour la reconstruction et le développement'' or ''BERD''), is an international financial institution founded in 1991 in Paris. As a multilat ...

also predicted that the invasion will cause a 20% decrease of Ukraine's GDP.

Child poverty

As in families everywhere, those with children suffer disproportionately more from poverty. Children are often born to young parents with limited income. According to the

United Nations Children's Fund UNICEF ( ), originally the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund, officially United Nations Children's Fund since 1953, is an agency of the United Nations responsible for providing humanitarian and developmental aid to childre ...

, childbirth benefits in Ukraine decreased the poverty rate among its beneficiaries from 66.4% to 59.9%. The monthly payment has not been revised since 2014, and is half the size of the officially approved subsistence level.

Regional distribution

The analysis of poverty was conducted using the household survey data for 2001 provided by the

State Statistics Service of Ukraine State Statistics Committee of Ukraine (, ''Derzhavnyi Komitet Statystyky Ukrainy'') is the government agency responsible for collection and dissemination of statistics in Ukraine. For brevity, it was also referred to as ''Derzhkomstat''. In 2010, ...

. In 2001 32.7% of the population was living on less than ₴150 per month per capita. In 2002 this figure declined to 26%, taking into account the introduction of a

Consumer Price Index A consumer price index (CPI) is a statistical estimate of the level of prices of goods and services bought for consumption purposes by households. It is calculated as the weighted average price of a market basket of Goods, consumer goods and ...

in 2002.

References

{{Poverty Poverty in Ukraine