New Delhi (PTI): India ranked 111th out of 125 countries in the Global Hunger Index-2023 with the country reporting the highest child wasting rate at 18.7 per cent.

The index was released on Thursday. India ranked 107th out of 121 countries in 2022.

The Global Hunger Index (GHI) is a tool for comprehensively measuring and tracking hunger at global, regional, and national levels.

With a score of 28.7 in the Global Hunger Index-2023, India has a level of hunger that is serious, according to a report based on the index.

India's neighbouring countries Pakistan (102th), Bangladesh (81st), Nepal (69th) and Sri Lanka (60th) have fared better than it in the index.

South Asia and Africa South of the Sahara are the world regions with the highest hunger levels, with a GHI score of 27 each, indicating serious hunger.

"India has the highest child wasting rate in the world, at 18.7 per cent, reflecting acute undernutrition,” the report based on the index stated. Wasting is measured based on children's weight relative to their height.

According to the index, the rate of undernourishment in India stood at 16.6 per cent and under-five mortality at 3.1 per cent.

The report also said that the prevalence of anaemia in women aged between 15 and 24 years stood at 58.1 per cent.

The 2023 Global Hunger Index (GHI) shows that, after many years of advancement up to 2015, progress against hunger worldwide remains largely at a standstill.

The 2023 GHI score for the world is 18.3, considered moderate and less than one point below the world's 2015 GHI score of 19.1.

Furthermore, since 2017 the prevalence of undernourishment, one of the indicators used in the calculation of GHI scores, has been on the rise, and the number of undernourished people has climbed from 572 million to about 735 million, the index said.