Sri Lanka has been ranked 53rd of 122 countries in the 2026 Global Hunger Index with a score of 10.2, the lowest — meaning best — score of any South Asian country with sufficient data.
The index was released on 14 October, The Island reported on Monday. The Daily Mirror carried its own account on Tuesday morning. The two agree on every Sri Lankan figure.
Where Sri Lanka sits
The score of 10.2 falls in the “moderate” hunger band, but close to the threshold for the “low” category — an improvement that has been two decades in the making.
| GHI score | Year |
|---|---|
| 22.1 | 2000 |
| 19.9 | 2006 |
| 20.8 | 2012 |
| 11.4 | 2018 |
| 10.2 | 2026 |
The underlying indicators: 4.9% of the population undernourished, 10.1% of children under five stunted, 9.3% affected by wasting, and an under-five mortality rate of 0.6%.
The regional picture
The Island supplies the comparison the Daily Mirror does not. Sri Lanka’s 10.2 is well clear of the rest of the region:
- Nepal — 14.5
- Bangladesh — 19.2
- India — 24.1
- Pakistan — 25.5
- Afghanistan — 28.6
Bhutan and the Maldives were not scored, for want of sufficient data. Sri Lanka has recorded the region’s lowest score in every reference year the index covers, so this is a continuation rather than a new position.
The warning attached to it
The report’s caution is that a good long-run trend is not armour against a sudden shock — and it uses Sri Lanka as the example.
Sri Lanka was the only country newly added to the Global Report on Food Crises’ country coverage in 2025, following Cyclone Ditwah. A country can improve its structural hunger indicators for twenty years and still be tipped into acute food insecurity by a single weather event.
That reads pointedly this week, with the island under flood and landslide warnings, reservoirs spilling and schools shut nationally — though neither filing draws that connection, and the index’s data predates the current system.
Globally
The 2026 global score is 18.1, also “moderate” — but higher than in 2018, interrupting the downward trend running since 2000. The report attributes the reversal to conflict, extreme weather and economic shocks, and warns that geopolitical tension, trade disruption and an intensifying El Niño could add further pressure where crises are already prolonged.
Not reported
The index measures four indicators — undernourishment, child stunting, child wasting and under-five mortality — on data covering 2021 to 2025, so the 2026 score does not capture the current year. Neither filing names the publishing organisations, gives Sri Lanka’s previous ranking for a like-for-like comparison, or explains why the 2012 score rose above 2006. Neither breaks out which of the four indicators drove the improvement from 11.4 to 10.2.
Note also that this desk is reporting the index thirteen days after its release; the Daily Mirror and The Island both filed well after publication date.
Sources: Lanka records lowest hunger score in South Asia — The Island, October 26, Sri Lanka ranks 53rd in 2026 Global Hunger Index — Daily Mirror, October 27.
