In 2024, India’s real gross domestic product (GDP) growth rate was around **** percent, the highest in South Asia. In contrast, Nepal reported the lowest real GDP growth rate in the region at approximately **** percent that year, but it was forecasted to increase to **** percent in 2026.Economy in South Asia In general, South Asia encompasses Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, India and Bhutan. In 2020, India had a GDP of over *** trillion U.S. dollars, while Bangladesh and Sri Lanka followed. The Maldives and Bhutan were among the countries with the lowest GDP in the Asia-Pacific region. In South Asia, the main economic activities include the services sector as well as the industrial and manufacturing sectors.Society in South AsiaFrom the South Asian countries, Bangladesh had the highest share of people living below the poverty line. The Maldives and Sri Lanka exhibited the highest and second-highest GDP per capita among the South Asian countries in 2021.

This dataset measures food availability and access for 76 low- and middle-income countries. The dataset includes annual country-level data on area, yield, production, nonfood use, trade, and consumption for grains and root and tuber crops (combined as R&T in the documentation tables), food aid, total value of imports and exports, gross domestic product, and population compiled from a variety of sources. This dataset is the basis for the International Food Security Assessment 2015-2025 released in June 2015. This annual ERS report projects food availability and access for 76 low- and middle-income countries over a 10-year period. Countries (Spatial Description, continued): Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ecuador, Egypt, El Salvador, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gambia, Georgia, Ghana, Guatemala, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Haiti, Honduras, India, Indonesia, Jamaica, Kenya, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, Lesotho, Liberia, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mauritania, Moldova, Mongolia, Morocco, Mozambique, Namibia, Nepal, Nicaragua, Niger, Nigeria, North Korea, Pakistan, Peru, Philippines, Rwanda, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Somalia, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Swaziland, Tajikistan, Tanzania, Togo, Tunisia, Turkmenistan, Uganda, Uzbekistan, Vietnam, Yemen, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. Resources in this dataset:Resource Title: CSV File for all years and all countries. File Name: gfa25.csvResource Title: International Food Security country data. File Name: GrainDemandProduction.xlsxResource Description: Excel files of individual country data. Please note that these files provide the data in a different layout from the CSV file. This version of the data files was updated 9-2-2021

More up-to-date files may be found at: https://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/international-food-security.aspx

In 2024, the unemployment rate in Pakistan was at approximately 5.47 percent, a slight increase from 5.41 percent the previous year. Unemployment as an economic key indicatorThe unemployment rate of a country represents the share of people without a job in the country’s labor force, i.e. unemployed persons among those who are able and/or willing to work. Among other factors, it takes population growth into account, and thus increases in the labor force, as well as the age of the population. A high unemployment rate usually indicates economic troubles, with a popular example being Greece, where the unemployment rate skyrocketed from 7.76 percent in 2008 to 27.5 percent as a result of the Great Recession. From plowshares to keyboardsWhile Pakistan’s unemployment slumped below the one percent mark in 2010, it is now on the rise again and currently standing at just over four percent. Traditionally, most Pakistanis work in agriculture however, the lion’s share of the country’s GDP is generated by services, like tourism, banking, and IT. While agriculture is still important for Pakistan’s economy, the services sector is gaining ground in the country, and more and more people are moving to urban areas from the countryside to find jobs in the cities.