The Africa Governance Report Each period as yielded varying degrees of economic performance. Recent economic performance on the continent is mixed. The global financial and economic crisis of 2008/2009 hampered growth in countries that were exposed to external shocks. Africa rebounded from the 2009 slowdown to a high growth rate of 5.4 per cent in 2010. Recent fluctuations in commodity prices have affected Member States differently, with non-oil exporting countries recording increases in GDP growth rates and the economies of oil exporting countries suffering. 6.2.2 National Development Planning and Poverty The World Bank and the United Nations have defined people living in poverty as those who live on less than USD 1.25 a day. In this report however, the poverty headcount measure is derived from national poverty lines. On this basis, regional aggregate data reveals that northern Africa, which posts low to medium GDP growth, also has the lowest incidence of poverty as measured through the Poverty Headcount Ratio. On the other hand, the south, which has a 100 per cent occurrence of NDPs and a reasonably high prevalence of medium and high real GDP growth rates posts very high levels of poverty, with 88 per cent of countries posting poverty levels of 50 per cent or greater. Similarly, the central Africa region has a high prevalence of poverty, although this is commensurate with low to medium GDP growth rates. The distribution of poverty in the eastern region matches the levels of real GDP growth, with 67 per cent of countries posting moderate levels of poverty. In west Africa, 64 per cent of countries have moderate levels of poverty of between 20 and 50 per cent and only 36 per cent have poverty levels exceeding 50 per cent, which is in tandem with the distribution of real GDP growth across the region. This means that on average, real GDP growth for countries in the south and central regions of Africa is not as inclusive as that of the north and the east of Africa. Figure 3: Poverty Headcount Ratios at National Poverty Lines by Region Source: World Bank, 2007-2017. 6.2.3 Human Development Index The African Union Agenda 2063 explicitly mentions development in two of its seven aspirations: Page 69 of 96