Over one-third of Papua's rural population lived in poverty in September 2021.

Papua has the highest poverty rate nationally. The majority of Papua's poor population lives in rural areas; in fact, more than one-third of the rural population in Papua lives in poverty.

Based on data from the Central Statistics Agency (BPS), the number of people in Papua Province living below the poverty line was 944,490 in September 2021. This figure represents 27.38% of the total population, the highest percentage among the 33 other provinces.

According to place of residence, 895,260 people in rural Papua lived below the poverty line. This amounts to 36.5% of the total rural population. This means that more than one-third of the rural population in Papua lives in poverty.

Meanwhile, the number of poor people in urban Papua was only 49,230, or 4.94% of the total urban population. This data shows a significant disparity between the poor in rural and urban Papua, highlighting the need for focused attention to improve the conditions of rural communities in Indonesia's easternmost province.

Papuan residents are categorized as poor if their expenditure to meet basic needs is below Rp 600,790 per capita per month, or Rp 2,990,000 per poor household per month (September 2021).

For rural areas, the poverty line is Rp 582,160 per capita per month. The poverty line for urban areas is Rp 643,070 per capita per month.