India Lifts 800 Million Out of Poverty ‘Simply by Smartphone,’ UNGA President Praises Digital Revolution

Dennis Francis, the President of the 78th session of the UN General Assembly, praised India for its efforts in utilizing digitization to accelerate development, noting that in the last five to six years, India had pulled 800 million people out of poverty.

He emphasized the ease with which individuals in India’s rural areas may pay their bills and make payments using only their smartphones.

“Providing the basis to rapid development, such as through digitalisation. Take, for example, the case of India…India has been able to lift 800 million people out of poverty over the last 5-6 years simply by the use of smartphones,” Francis stated at the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) lecture on the subject of “Accelerating progress towards Zero Hunger for the current and future generations.”

Francis emphasized that one of the main reasons India has benefited while many other Global South countries have not is that India has a high internet penetration rate.

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“Rural farmers in India who never had a relationship with the banking system, are now able to transact all their businesses on their smartphone. They pay their bills, they receive payments for orders. 800 million people lifted out of poverty. Because there is a high level of internet penetration in India, almost everyone has a cellphone,” the UNGA president further stated.

“That is not the case in many parts of the Global South. So, there has to be equity demands, there has to be some effort, initiative to address this inequality as an initial step in negotiating the global framework for digitalisation,” he added.