Hong Kong protests, US-China trade war blamed as city marks high of 1.5 million under poverty line ... and that’s just for 2019
- Latest government report based on figures compared with 2018, and does not take into account Covid-19 pandemic this year
- But expert cautions against reading too much into statistics as numbers reflect relative poverty, with poverty line set at 50 per cent of median household income
The number of underprivileged Hongkongers has grown by nearly 100,000 in over a year, with the city marking an 11-year high of about 1.5 million people struggling under the poverty line, according to the latest government report on 2019 figures released on Wednesday.
Authorities attributed the worsening problem to “a double whammy of the local social incidents and [US-China] trade tensions” that had hit the economy, while social workers warned of an even gloomier picture this year amid the Covid-19 pandemic.
According to the Hong Kong Poverty Situation Report, Kwung Tong recorded the highest poverty rate among districts of 27.2 per cent, or 180,300 residents living beneath the poverty line.
This was followed by Sham Shui Po and Kwai Tsing, both of which recorded a poverty rate of 24.7 per cent. In terms of low-income population numbers, Yuen Long had 141,600 while Sha Tin marked 137,000.
The report, which was tabled for discussion at Wednesday’s meeting of the Commission on Poverty, only covered 2019 and had yet to reflect the impact of the coronavirus on the city.
