Wars, debt, climate crisis and Covid have halted anti-poverty fight – World Bank

Workers at a deserted fish market in Senegal. The World Bank said countries with high levels of inequality were concentrated in sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean. Photograph: Seyllou/AFP/Getty Images

Wars, debt, the climate crisis and the pandemic have combined to halt progress in the fight against poverty, the World Bank has warned.

The Washington-based institution said on current trends it would take more than three decades to lift the near-700 million people living on less than $2.15 (£1.64) a day above the widely accepted definition of extreme poverty.