In 2024, global employment expanded in line with a growing labour force, keeping the global unemployment rate steady at 5 per cent, similar to that of 2023. Slowing productivity growth remains a major bottleneck with respect to expanding the opportunities for decent work.

As climate change intensifies, it is imperative for policymakers to address the escalating loss and damage it inflicts on vulnerable communities in developing countries.

Developing countries spent a record $443.5 billion to service their external public and publicly guaranteed debt in 2022. These costs shifted scarce resources away from health, education, environment and other critical areas, the World Bank’s latest International Debt Report showed.

UNCTAD’s Least Developed Countries Report 2023 calls on the global community to urgently address the critical financial challenges faced by the world’s 46 most vulnerable nations.

This edition of the Macro Poverty Outlooks periodical contains country-by-country forecasts and overviews for GDP, fiscal, debt and poverty indicators for the developing countries of the Sub-Saharan Africa region.

African cities and local governments are under increasing pressure to provide infrastructure and services to the growing population. Yet, most remain severely under-resourced, leaving them unable to make the necessary investments.

Severe climate impacts are burdening countries worldwide, particularly the least developed countries and Small Island Developing States. Each disaster adds to their existing debt, hindering recovery and trapping them in an unsustainable cycle.

Fourteen nations, which host more than half of the world's refugees, are paying as much in interest on external debt as it would cost to educate millions of refugee children for nearly five years, according to this new report by Save the Children calling for greater priority to be given to educate children on the move.

The United Nations Trade and Development Conference (UNCTAD) in its latest Trade and Development Report Update warns that developing countries are facing years of difficulty as the global economy slows down amid heightened financial turbulence.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) forecast in their latest World Economic Outlook published, that global growth will bottom out at 2.8 percent this year before rising modestly to around three percent in 2024, representing a 0.1 per cent fall on its January projections.