August 20, 2024
The chart shows the weekly area burned by wildfires globally and in Africa from 2012 to 2024. This August saw an abrupt increase in the area burned by wildfires, with most of this rise coming in a single week.
This global weekly burn rate was 64% higher than any previous week during this period. This data comes from the Global Wildfire Information System.
This dramatic rise was mostly driven by severe wildfires in Africa, where approximately 22 million hectares burned in a week, accounting for around 80% of the global burned area.
Two countries have been particularly hard-hit — Angola and the Democratic Republic of Congo — where 6% and 2.5% of the total land area have burned in just one week.
Today
Around one in three people worldwide — that’s 2.8 billion — could not afford a healthy diet in 2022. This is based on the most recent estimates from the World Bank and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.
A “healthy diet” is defined as one that follows nutritional guidelines, making sure that someone has enough variety to meet all of their dietary needs. It is considered unaffordable when the lowest possible cost of the diet, along with essentials like housing and transportation, is higher than what someone earns each day.
In low- to middle-income countries like India or Pakistan and much of Sub-Saharan Africa, more than half of the population struggles to afford a healthy diet, with rates exceeding 90% in the poorest.
Read more about diet affordability →
Yesterday
Guyana, a small country in South America, has seen the fastest growth in gross domestic product (GDP) per capita in the world over the past decade.
This is illustrated in the chart, which shows GDP per capita for Guyana and the World, based on estimates from the World Bank.
The data is adjusted for inflation, so Guyana’s sharp growth is not due to price changes over time.
A large and sudden expansion in oil production has driven most of this growth. In 2020, Guyana began extracting oil. From 2020 to 2023, the country’s oil production grew 425%, making it a key contributor to global crude oil supply growth.
Over this period, Guyana’s GDP per capita rose from below the global average to well above it.
Read more about economic development and oil production →
October 14
On average, Americans spend about the same amount on food consumed at home as they did in the 1950s. But they spend a lot more in restaurants, cafes, and at work.
The chart shows the average amount of money spent on food, at home and away from home in the United States. This is based on data from the USDA Economic Research Service. It’s adjusted for inflation over time.
Today, the amount spent on food away from home is about the same as what is spent on food at home.
Explore data on food expenditure across the world →
October 11
Teenage pregnancy rates have fallen across all regions in the last few decades.
The chart shows the number of live births per 1,000 women aged 15 to 19 since 2000, based on data compiled by the United Nations.
Globally, rates have fallen by around one-third. This decline has been even more dramatic in some regions. For example, rates have fallen by more than two-thirds in Central and South Asia.
Birth rates have also fallen among adolescents aged 10 to 14 years old, where health concerns for pregnancy in such young girls are even greater.
Explore teenage pregnancy data for individual countries over time →
October 10
When it comes to demographic trends, few are as well known as the “baby boom”.
The baby boom was a sharp rise in the fertility rate toward the end of the Second World War and for decades after. It happened in several countries around the world, but it was especially pronounced in the United States.
Before the baby boom, the US had seen a long-term decline in the fertility rate, down to about 2 children per woman by the 1930s.
During the baby boom, the fertility rate rose sharply, almost doubling to nearly 4 children per woman — levels that hadn’t been seen since the beginning of the 20th century. By the early 1970s, the fertility rate had returned to about 2 children per woman. Today, it’s just over 1.6.
It’s estimated that more than 70 million people were born in the US between 1946 and 1964, the official years of the baby boom according to the US Census Bureau. By 1964, this generation comprised almost 40% of the nation’s population.
As such a large generation, “baby boomers” have played a significant role in shaping many social, economic, and political trends in modern US history.
Learn more about fertility rates over time →
October 09
The number of people dying in road accidents in the United Kingdom has fallen by around three-quarters since 1970.
The chart shows the number of road deaths over time, based on data from the OECD, which we just updated. This includes the deaths of pedestrians, drivers, passengers, and cyclists.
In the early 1970s, there were around 8,000 road deaths per year. This has dropped below 2,000 in recent years. Deaths reached a low in 2020 due to reduced traffic from the COVID-19 pandemic but have rebounded slightly since then.
This multi-decade decline is even steeper when we look at the number of deaths per kilometer driven.
Explore road death data for other countries →
October 08
In 2023, wind power generated nearly 60% of Denmark’s electricity. This made Denmark the country with the highest share of wind in its electricity mix. This is based on data from Ember.
Wind also contributes significantly to Denmark’s broader energy system. Data from the Energy Institute shows that wind power accounts for over a quarter of Denmark’s total primary energy consumption — the largest figure globally.
Denmark also ranks first in per capita wind power generation, with Sweden close behind.
Explore more data on energy sources in our Data Explorer →
