Poverty on decline in world, according to latest ILO report. - The developing countries and the advanced economies reacted better to the financial crisis than the advanced countries, according to the latest annual report of the International Labour Organisation (ILO) on work throughout the world. The ILO notes that the economic convergence between the developing countries and the advanced economies has taken off: between 1980 and 2011, the revenue per head of population grew by 3.3% a year on average in the developing countries, which is far more quickly than in the advanced economies, with their growth rate of 1.8%. This convergence process has picked up speed since the early 2000s, particularly since the beginning of the crisis of 2007-2008. In 2013, the number of people out of work grew by nearly 5 million people throughout the world to reach 201.8 million. In total, the economic crisis which began in 2007 is believed to have cost nearly 32 million jobs. The rate remains high in the developed countries, at 8.6% of the active population (compared to 5.8% in 2007). In the developing countries, on the other hand, it has grown only slightly, from 5.5% in 2007 to 5.9%, before falling back towards pre-crisis levels. In many countries, however, the quality of jobs leaves a lot to be desired, with considerable disparities. In the countries where in-work poverty (less than $2 a day) has seen the sharpest drops since the early 2000s, the income per head of population grew by 3.5% a year on average over the period 2007-2012. For the countries which progressed less since the early 2000s, the figure is 2.4%. Fast economic growth has helped to reduce extreme poverty (less than $1.25 a day): in 1994, 39% of all workers in the world were living in extreme poverty. This percentage fell to 13% last year. The number of workers living in situations of moderate poverty (between $1.25 and $2 a day), on the other hand, has not changed. Adding both of these categories together, slightly more than 30% of workers in the developing countries remain poor, compared to nearly 63% twenty years earlier. The ILO also reports a relatively recent phenomenon: the emergence of a category of so-called “middle-class” workers, divided into two sub-categories of, firstly, workers earning between $4 and $13 a day and, secondly, those earning more than $13 a day. More than four out of every ten workers belong to one of these two sub-categories, more than double the figure from 1994. This number is expected to increase by nearly 290 million people by 2018, the ILO estimates. One cloud on the horizon, however, is that more than half of all workers in the developing countries (1.47 billion people) are still self-employed or in an unpaid family job. These people are “vulnerable” and do not have the protection of social security cover or strict employment laws. (IL)