Pakistan has recorded the highest hunger score in South Asia in the 2026 Global Hunger Index, according to Dawn, a finding that points to a worsening food security crisis in a country where the cost of living has already become a central political issue. The report, released on Wednesday, landed the day before World Food Day.

The index, published this year under the theme “No Security Without Food Security,” was prepared by Welthungerhilfe, the Institute for International Law of Peace and Armed Conflict at Ruhr University Bochum and the Swiss organisation Helvetas. It found that progress in reducing hunger across South Asia has largely stalled, with conditions in Pakistan and Afghanistan worsening since 2018. The regional score stands at 23.5, which falls in the “serious” category. Some reports put Pakistan’s own score at 25.5, also in the serious band, which runs from 20 to 34.9.

The global picture is no better. The worldwide score rose to 18.1 in 2026, compared with 17.6 in 2018, which means hunger has increased after nearly two decades of progress. The authors point to state-based armed conflicts, which are now at their highest level since the Second World War, and to the growing frequency of extreme weather events as major drivers of the reversal. According to estimates by the Food and Agriculture Organisation, 218 million people in South Asia, including Iran, were undernourished between 2023 and 2025, around one-third of the global total.

For Pakistan, the report identifies a mix of causes. Economic instability and sharp food price inflation have eroded household purchasing power and limited access to adequate food, while heavy rains and flooding have caused localised crop losses in parts of the country. A separate UN-backed assessment, the Global Report on Food Crises released in April, found that around 11 million people in Pakistan faced acute food insecurity in 2025. The index itself measures chronic conditions, while that assessment captures sudden shortages, and together they paint a picture of a population that is both structurally vulnerable and exposed to shocks.

The findings arrive at an awkward moment. Only weeks ago, the government and the IMF were describing the economy as stabilised, with a successful Eurobond issuance, credit rating upgrades and a primary surplus ahead of target. The hunger index shows how differently stability can look from the perspective of a household. A balanced budget and healthy reserves do not by themselves put food on the table, and for families spending most of their income on food, fuel and utilities, inflation in those categories matters more than the headline indicators.

The government has taken some steps aimed at relief. Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s fuel scheme offers a Rs100 per litre discount to motorcyclists, rickshaw users and small car owners, while the Punjab government has approved a Rs10 billion subsidy on flour as wheat prices rise, and federal authorities have asked seed companies to lower wheat seed prices ahead of the sowing season. Punjab Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz used World Food Day to promise continued support for farmers. These measures target specific pressure points, but they are limited in scale compared with the size of the problem the index describes.

There is also a structural dimension. Pakistan’s agriculture sector is exposed to climate shocks, water scarcity and rising input costs, and smallholder farmers often have little room to absorb a bad season. When floods or heat waves reduce output, prices rise for urban consumers as well, which links rural vulnerability to urban food insecurity. The index points to this chain, and it is why policymakers have increasingly framed food security as a national security issue rather than a purely agricultural one.

The report does not claim that nothing has improved. Pakistan’s score is lower than it was in 2000, and the country has made gains on child health and nutrition programmes in some areas. But the index’s central message is that progress has stalled just as shocks are becoming more frequent. For a country that has just seen its economic indicators praised abroad, the more difficult question is whether those improvements will reach the plates of the households the index is measuring, and how quickly.

Compiled by the Weekly PK Social Affairs Desk.