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Journalism of Courage
Poorest Global Economies By GDP Per Capita 2025: As the global economy navigates an uncertain path with projected growth rates of 3.3 percent in 2025 and 2026, a stark reality persists: extreme poverty continues to plague nations worldwide. While economic powerhouses in Europe and Asia boast impressive GDP per capita figures, millions struggle to survive in the world’s most impoverished economies. From South Sudan, identified as the world’s poorest economy, to other struggling African nations and even populous countries like India facing significant GDP per capita disparities, we examine the factors contributing to their economic hardship and the urgent need for global action.
Countries like Luxembourg, Singapore, Macau SAR, and more have highlighted their impressive GDP per capita figures, owing to their strategic locations, robust financial services sector, and thriving as top tourist destinations, which have led them to reaffirm their status as the wealthiest economies in 2025.
However, the 2024 report from the UNDP’s Multidimensional Poverty Index reveals a stark reality: approximately 1.1 billion people, out of a global population of 6.3 billion across 112 countries, experienced poverty last year.
Despite the vast wealth available worldwide, conversely, African countries to date face severe poverty challenges, highlighting the persistent challenges of economic disparity globally.
South Sudan continues to be identified as the world’s poorest economy with the lowest GDP per capita in 2025, owing to ongoing economic difficulties, political turmoil, persistent conflict, and inadequate infrastructure.
Even other African nations, such as the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Mozambique, similarly struggle with poverty linked to internal strife, political instability, and insufficient infrastructure, which impede their economic development.
India, even though being the world’s fifth-largest economy, faces a notable difference in GDP per capita, ranking in the bottom 100 countries with a GDP per capita of $11.94 thousand as of 2025.
| Rank | Country | GDP-PPP per capita (in international dollars, thousand) |
| 1 | South Sudan | $960.24 |
| 2 | Burundi | $1.01 thousand |
| 3 | Central African Republic | $1.31 thousand |
| 4 | Malawi | $1.76 thousand |
| 5 | Mozambique | $1.79 thousand |
| 6 | Somalia | $1.9 thousand |
| 7 | Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) | $1.91 thousand |
| 8 | Liberia | $2 thousand |
| 9 | Yemen | $2.02 thousand |
| 10 | Madagascar | $2.06 thousand |
Source: IMF
Methodology:
Gross Domestic Product (GDP) refers to a country’s entire economic output, including all products and services generated. Dividing GDP by the number of full-time inhabitants reveals the average wealth of the population.
However, a more comprehensive estimate of a country’s wealth includes inflation rates and local pricing levels, resulting in the notion of Purchasing Power Parity (PPP).
While neither metric can precisely rank nations based on wealth (due to variables such as tax havens inflating GDP estimates), GDP per capita adjusted for PPP provides a useful view on various countries’ relative economic position.
