Poverty in Mexico - Fact Sheet

• In 2002, half the population in Mexico was living in poverty and one fifth was living in extreme poverty.  At the national level, in 2002 the rates for access to electricity, water and sanitation were 98, 90 and 80 percent, respectively.

• Between 2000 y 2002, access to electricity increased from 63 to 90 percent in the population living in extreme poverty in rural  areas. Access to drinking water increased from 38 to 58 percent, while access to sanitation services increased only from 22 to 26 percent.  While almost 70 percent of the moderate poor have their own house, only 5 percent indicated that they were paying for their house, which is an indicator of the predominantly self-financed purchase and construction process.

• The crisis of 1994-1995 was a setback for Mexico: between 1996 and 2002, extreme poverty decreased by 17 percentage points to 20 percent, only one percentage point below the level prior to the 1994 crisis.

• The decreases in extreme poverty at the rural and national levels are statistically significant; the decrease in urban poverty is not statistically significant.  Only between 4 and 9 percent still live on less than one dollar a day, a level close to that found in some of the world's poorest countries.

• Inequality in Mexico has tended to be counter-cyclical:  it was reduced by the 1994-1995 crisis, but increased with the 1996-2000 recovery and was then reduced by the 2000-2003 stagnation. After having reached the already very high Latin American average, Mexico fell slightly under the average in 2002.

• About one quarter of those living in extreme poverty in Mexico reside in urban areas in the states in the center of the country.

• While total spending increased on average by 6.3 percent a year between 2000 and 2002, social development spending increased on average by 5.3 percent a year and poverty reduction spending increased by 14.2 percent annually. Overall, the growth in social spending since the mid-1990s was achieved despite fiscal constraints.

• Spending on programs specifically targeted to the poor now represents 1.3 percent of GDP, compared with 0.7 percent in 1990. Programs involving transfers to the poor, spearheaded by OPORTUNIDADES (formerly PROGRESA) have since their creation grown by 8.4 percent a year on average during the 1990s and by still more (9.8 percent) since 2000.