The crisis in family pockets: lived poverty in Angola

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Economy

The crisis in
family pockets: lived poverty in Angola

63% of Angolans went hungry at least once in the past year, according to the Afrobarometer Lived Poverty Index. A trend analysis between 2019 and 2024.

Autor: David Boio  ·  10 min read

Analysis
WHAT ANGOLANS THINK

ECONOMY

The crisis in
family pockets: lived poverty in Angola

Poverty as lived experience

The Afrobarometer Lived Poverty Index (LPI) measures how often, in the past year, respondents went without food, clean water, medical care, cooking fuel or cash income. In Angola's Round 10 (2024/2025), 63% of Angolans report having gone without food at least once in the past year — up from 54% in Round 8 (2019). For clean water, the figure is 57%; for medical care, 49%.

A deterioration that defies economic growth narratives

Angola's official GDP grew between 2021 and 2024, driven largely by oil revenues. Yet the Lived Poverty Index moved in the opposite direction: more Angolans report going without basic necessities in 2024 than in 2019. This divergence between macroeconomic indicators and lived experience is one of the central findings of Round 10.

The data is also geographically unequal: in Luanda, 41% report going without food at least once; in the rural provinces of the south and east, the figure exceeds 75%. Growth, where it exists, is not reaching the majority of the population.