The Ledger · Entry 35
Are fewer people dying in famines?
Yes. Decade death toll from famines worldwide, per 100,000 people was 1,241.8 in 1870. By 2020 it was 13.4. Data retrieved 2026-08-22.
Death rates from famine have fallen sharply since the 1870s
Data: Our World in Data, based on the World Peace Foundation
This series adds up every year's estimated famine deaths within each decade and divides by the population, so each point is a decade's cumulative toll, not an annual rate. Judged that way, the 1870s were the deadliest decade in the record: harvest failures and war across Asia, Africa, and Europe killed more than a thousand people per 100,000 in the population alive at the time.
The key rows
The decline across a century and a half is not a straight line. It ticked back up in the 2010s, and it is not finished: this dataset counts only events killing 100,000 or more, so it leaves out smaller, chronic hunger crises that fall outside that threshold.
Asked often
Has famine become rarer?
Judged by this decade-level series, yes. The death rate from famines fell from 1,241.8 per 100,000 people in the 1870s to 13.4 in the 2020s, a partial decade with data through 2023, though the 2010s and 2020s ticked up from the series' low point in the 2000s.
What counts as a famine in this data?
The World Peace Foundation, whose dataset this series is built from, counts events estimated to have killed 100,000 people or more from mass starvation. Smaller, chronic hunger crises are not included, so the series tracks the largest catastrophes rather than all hunger-related death.
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