Mexican officials say poverty levels vary greatly by geography

from the San Diego Union Tribune

MEXICO CITY – Poverty affects nearly half of Mexico's population, but levels vary significantly throughout the country, reaching their highest in the southeast, officials said Wednesday.

The southern state of Chiapas, with a 75.7 percent poverty rate, is Mexico's poorest, while the northern border state of Baja California has the lowest poverty, at 9.2 percent, according to The National Council for the Evaluation of Social Development Policy.

The council released data in the form of maps that, for the first time, pinpointed poverty rates at the local and statewide level in the country's 31 states and the capital, Mexico City.

According to the maps, which the council based on national poverty figures in 2005, the poorest states after Chiapas are Guerrero, Oaxaca and Tabasco. All three are in the south and have poverty rates of at least 59 percent.

The least impoverished states, besides Baja California, are Baja California Sur and the northeastern state of Nuevo Leon, with respective poverty rates of 27.5 percent and 23.5 percent. Mexico city places third with 31.8 percent.

In 2005, poverty affected nearly 45 million people in Mexico, or about 47 percent of its population. Of that number, 18.2 percent live in conditions of “extreme poverty,” described as being too poor to even feed one's family.

“Mexico is a country of great contrasts. ... The inequality is embarrassing,” council representative Juan Angel Rivera said.