PORTLAND, USA, Sep 28 2026 (IPS) - Dozens of government-funded pension programs providing benefits to hundreds of millions of men and women face growing fiscal strain and long-term sustainability challenges. These pressures are largely driven by rapid demographic transitions, including ageing populations, declining fertility, rising life expectancy, and shrinking workforces.

Many state pension systems rely on current workers to finance benefits for current retirees. In countries such as France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and the United States, these systems face increasing financial pressure as the number of workers supporting each retiree declines, while retirees live longer and collect benefits for more years.

Smaller generations are entering the workforce as larger generations retire and begin receiving pension benefits. This demographic shift is placing growing pressure on pension systems and raising concerns about their ability to meet future obligations.

As a result of these significant demographic changes, relatively fewer workers are paying into pension systems to support growing numbers of retirees who are living longer and collecting benefits for more years.

At the same time, extended families, local communities, and other traditional forms of support for retirees are weakening. Moreover, formal pension systems, including government-backed programs, have proven to be difficult to reform and, in some cases, financially unsustainable. In a growing number of countries, government pension programs are also facing insolvency.

Global life expectancy at age 65, for example, has reached 18 years, a 50% increase from 12 years in 1960. At the same time, the share of the world’s population aged 65 and older has more than doubled, from 5% in 1960 to 11% today. Global fertility has also fallen sharply, from 4.7 births per woman in 1960 to 2.2 today. Moreover, these demographic trends are expected to continue well into the 21st century (Table 1).

Source: United Nations.

Population ageing is particularly evident in some more developed countries. For example, a quarter or more of the populations of Germany, Italy, and Japan are aged 65 and older.

Moreover, the proportion of older persons is expected to increase significantly in many countries in the coming decades. By mid-century, for example, about a third or more of the populations of China, Italy, Japan, the Republic of Korea, and Spain are projected to be aged 65 and older (Figure 1).

Source: United Nations.

As a result of significant demographic changes in age structure, longevity, fertility, and the workforce, the number of pension beneficiaries is growing relative to the number of workers whose payroll taxes often finance these programs.

By 2050, the ratios of workers to retirees are expected to decline significantly in many of the world’s largest economies. In 2020, these ratios ranged from about 2 workers per retiree in Japan to about 5 in China. By 2050, the ratios are projected to fall to between 1 to 2 workers per retiree in these countries.

Furthermore, despite population ageing, increased longevity among older persons, and fewer workers per retiree, official retirement ages for receiving government pension benefits have remained largely unchanged.

Countries are moving closer to the point when their pension programs may be unable to pay full scheduled benefits. Unless governments take action, pension revenues will become insufficient in many countries to cover scheduled benefits, with financial shortfalls expected to grow substantially over the coming years

Consequently, pension costs are projected to rise as more workers reach retirement age, while slower population and economic growth constrain the tax bases that support many of the pension programs.

As the ratio of workers to retirees worsens, government officials face difficult choices about raising retirement ages, adjusting benefits, and increasing taxes.

Countries are moving closer to the point when their pension programs may be unable to pay full scheduled benefits. Unless governments take action, pension revenues will become insufficient in many countries to cover scheduled benefits, with financial shortfalls expected to grow substantially over the coming years.

The longer governments delay necessary reforms, the larger the adjustments are likely to be to close these financing gaps. Such adjustments could involve changes to revenue, benefits, retirement ages, or other program provisions.

Despite repeated warnings from pension officials and approaching financial shortfalls, pension reform has received relatively little government attention. Policymakers have generally avoided proposing comprehensive legislation to ensure the long-term financial solvency of their pension programs.

The growing pension peril underscores the urgency of addressing these financial challenges well before programs reach their projected insolvency dates. Acting sooner would give policymakers more time to make gradual changes and restore long-term financial balance.

As some countries have done in the past, governments could establish national commissions to examine the long-term finances of their pension programs. These commissions could develop recommendations and present them to government officials well before projected insolvency dates, giving policymakers adequate time to consider and implement reforms.

Governments have several options for addressing expected pension shortfalls. Policymakers could eliminate or raise the ceiling on earnings subject to payroll taxes, increase payroll tax rates paid by employers and employees, reduce cost-of-living adjustments for high-income beneficiaries, and gradually raise the retirement age as life expectancy increases.

Many of these measures, however, are politically difficult and unpopular with much of the public. Some countries, for example, are considering raising their official retirement ages, but such proposals are opposed by large proportions of the public.

Opinion surveys also indicate a preference for lower retirement ages. For example, respondents in 18 mostly middle-income countries say, on average, that the best age to retire is around 58 (Figure 2).

Source: Pew Research Center.

In sum, many national pension systems are in peril. Significant demographic changes – especially population ageing, increased longevity, declining fertility, and shrinking workforces – are placing growing financial pressure on many government pension programs and threatening their long-term sustainability.

Despite these well-known challenges and the prospect of growing financial shortfalls, government leaders have shown limited willingness to make the difficult policy choices needed to address them. Unless policymakers act, many national pension programs could face serious funding gaps, potentially leading to significant reductions in scheduled benefits for retirees and other beneficiaries.

Joseph Chamie is a consulting demographer, a former director of the United Nations Population Division, and author of many publications on population issues.

COX'S BAZAR, Bangladesh, Sep 28 2026 (IPS) - For Mohammed Dullah, recent cuts in UN food rations for Rohingya and other refugees in Bangladesh are not just spreading hunger but also forcing them to save on basic needs such as schooling and healthcare for his children.

“I was able to manage with my children somehow when I used to get $12 by going to work sometimes,” said Dullah, 59. “But since the reduction to seven dollars [per family member] a month, I can’t afford lots of basics anymore, like clothes, tuition fees, meat, or fish one or two times a month.”

As a result, his 15-year-old son has had to give up school to work in a market where he can earn about 6,000 taka ($49) a month to help sustain their family of nine.

Since April, food assistance has been allocated under a revised Targeting and Prioritisation Exercise (TPE) introduced by the World Food Programme (WFP). Households among the nearly 1.2 million refugees in Cox’s Bazar and Bhasan Char receive different levels of monthly food rations based on categories of assessed vulnerability.

WFP says the new system sets food aid at $12, $10 or $7 per person per month, depending on the household’s level of food insecurity. With money provided through UNHCR registration cards, families buy food from designated WFP e-voucher outlets.

Refugees limit what they eat and trade any surplus food for money to spend on healthcare, education, transport outside the camps and other necessities. For families with no access to formal employment, which is prohibited in the camps, even a relatively small reduction can result in making difficult choices.

Humanitarian agencies are warning that global funding cuts are driving up hunger levels. Children make up more than half of the refugee population in Cox’s Bazar.

“Conditions in the world’s largest refugee settlement are worsening at an alarming rate after nine years, with 35% of Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh expected to face ‘crisis’ or ‘emergency’ hunger levels this year, putting more children at risk of malnutrition,” Save the Children stated on August 25.

“Global humanitarian funding cuts, compounded by the resulting reductions in food rations over the past year, have exacerbated existing challenges which include overcrowded living conditions and limited access to clean water, nutritious food and livelihoods.”

A System Under Pressure

The Rohingya have been displaced from Myanmar over decades, with major waves of refugees arriving in Bangladesh in 1991–92 and again after the military-led violence of 2017. More recently, people have fled renewed violence in Rakhine State between the Myanmar military and the Arakan Army (AA), an ethnic armed organisation.

Nearly a decade after the 2017 mass exodus, many Rohingya families remain fully dependent on humanitarian assistance. Bangladesh restricts refugees’ access to formal employment, while humanitarian organisations provide food, basic informal education, basic healthcare, water, sanitation and other essential services.

International funding has come under increasing pressure. The UN and its partners have appealed for $710.5 million under the updated 2026 Joint Response Plan (JRP) to support Rohingya refugees and host communities, its lowest level in a decade. So far this year it is 50 percent funded.

WFP’s new assessment found that all Rohingya refugees were food insecure, but that severity differed between households. Households are newly classified into three categories: extremely food-insecure households receive US$12 per person per month, highly food-insecure households receive $10, and food-insecure households, which make up almost 70% of the total, receive $7.

The system is intended to allocate assistance according to need rather than simply impose a blanket reduction because of funding shortages.

WFP says that even the lowest level of assistance is sufficient to meet minimum food needs. But families and INGOs in interviews with this reporter describe a more complicated reality.

Dullah says he is unable to work because of a long-term illness, but his household was categorised at the $7-per-person level. According to Dullah, the family receives basic food items, including rice and cooking oil, but they have little left over to obtain other foods or meet other expenses.

As with other Rohingya refugees, Dullah has no legal access to paid employment, but the levels of food they receive force them to work.

“You cannot expect people to become self-reliant while preventing them from earning a living. If WFP and other agencies want us to rely more on ourselves, they also need to support legal opportunities for Rohingya refugees to work and earn an income,” he said.

“Even before, we struggled with not having enough food when we got $12,” said Dullah, who worries about his children’s growth development. His 18-month-old granddaughter needs infant formula because her mother, lacking in food, struggled to meet the child’s needs by natural feeding.

WFP essentially categorised households according to their composition.

For example, the Extremely Food Insecure bracket includes those headed by a child or by a person with disabilities, female-headed households without an able-bodied adult man aged 18–59, elderly-headed households without an able-bodied adult man, households with two or more persons with disabilities, and one-member households.

The main category of food insecurity covers male-headed households with able-bodied men and no members with disabilities, female-headed households with an able-bodied man and no members with disabilities, and households without females aged 18 to 49 or without members with disabilities.

Selling Food to Pay for Other Needs

Sawyedul Amin, 34, receives assistance valued at $10 per person for his household living in Lambashia Camp in Kutupalong. They fled Myanmar in 2017, losing their father on a mountain along the way.

He has two young children, a sick mother and a wife who has undergone two operations, one related to childbirth and another for a tumour.

“If we want to eat fish or meat, we cannot afford it,” he said. “We also have small children, which means we have additional expenses for them. I also have an ill mother, which makes our medical expenses even greater.”

Sawyedul said he sometimes sells part of his family’s food allocation to obtain cash for those expenses.

Selling or trading food for medicines or services is nothing new in the camps, and the impact has been well documented in earlier cuts.

In 2023 funding shortages forced WFP to reduce monthly food rations from $12 to $10 and then further to $8 in June that year. Monitoring found deteriorating food consumption and worsening nutrition indicators.

Sawyedul said other organisations previously sometimes provided his family with additional assistance, but some of that support has declined. “We now have only the WFP to look to for assistance,” he said.

Flaws in the Rationing System

Radia Bala, a 60-year-old widow among a refugee community of about 1,000 Hindus, had to survive with no assistance at all for five months this year. Her family, along with many others, eventually started to receive aid in July.

Radia, from Nakpura village in Myanmar, arrived in Bangladesh with her family in 2024 after fighting between AA insurgents and the Myanmar military spread through her area.

She recalls ground and air attacks, homes burnt down, and relatives and neighbours killed around her. The insurgents also targeted them for forced recruitment. Their escape involved a three-day journey, partly through mountains.

After reaching Bangladesh, Radia says her family received a smart card and initially received food assistance, cooking gas and soap. But then it stopped in December 2025. “I wasn’t given an exact reason by the authorities why it was stopped,” she said.

Radia now rents space in the house of a local Bangladeshi family from the Barua ethnic group. She is among nearly 150,000 newly arrived refugees who have not been provided with shelter, having crossed from Myanmar’s Rakhine State between December 2024 and March 2026.

Radia and her daughter, who has a six-month-old baby, work as cleaners to survive. “During those months [with no food aid], we ate only rice with leafy vegetables,” she said. When assistance was available, she said, the family could sometimes eat chicken, eggs and bananas.

Her experience highlights serious flaws in the system of allocating food rations, namely that access depends on registration and connection to the mechanisms through which it is delivered.

Radia says that when people from her community arrived in 2024, they were told that food assistance would be available if they stayed inside the camps. But she says the family found it difficult to remain there because of shortages of shelters, water, toilets and washrooms.

“We stayed in the camp for about a month in a relative’s shelter, but life there was very difficult,” she said.

Her family subsequently moved between relatives’ homes and other temporary locations. “We have been living from place to place, staying on the streets and in other people’s homes.”

After raising complaints and following media coverage of their plight, she started receiving $12 per person. But Radia says she needs to sell half of that to pay for room rent.

Her request is simple. “Our first need is food assistance, and our second need is shelter,” she said.

WFP says it provides monthly food assistance to all the refugee population, including people who arrived after 2024, according to their assessed need.

Risks for Children are Worsening

Golam Mostofa, head of Save the Children’s Cox’s Bazar Area Office, said children are increasingly exposed to risks as families struggle with limited resources and opportunities.

“The situation is getting worse day by day,” he said.

Child protection monitoring had raised increasing concerns over child labour and child marriage, as well as other risks facing children and adolescents, he added.

However, Mostofa cautioned against assuming that every reported case of child labour, child marriage, malnutrition or dropping out of NGO learning centres was caused by the latest food-assistance changes.

However, Save the Children’s current assessment warns that worsening access to nutritious food, healthcare and other essentials is increasing pressure on children.

The NGO predicts that by the end of this year, some 10 percent of refugees in camps in Cox’s Bazar will fall into Phase 4 of the international classification of “humanitarian emergency”, which is defined as leading to frequent deaths and increasingly high rates of malnutrition. This is defined as one step before famine and humanitarian catastrophe.

Mostofa appealed to donors to continue supporting food, education, healthcare, water and sanitation while also expanding opportunities for skills development and safe livelihoods.

The WFP Bangladesh communication team did not respond to requests for comment.

Refugees Face Dangerous Choices

While Save the Children has been working in Cox’s Bazar since 2012 with programmes for education, healthcare, water and sanitation and child protection, a whole generation of Rohingya children has grown up in camps which began as emergency settlements but have turned into long-term places of residence.

For families with limited access to formal employment, humanitarian assistance remains central to daily life. Continued civil war in Myanmar, driven by an entrenched military regime backed by China, provides little prospect of a durable solution that would allow the mostly stateless Rohingya to return to their homes.

Committing their lives to human traffickers and fleeing Bangladesh by sea in search of a better life is extremely perilous. An estimated 5,000 refugees are believed to have perished over the past decade while attempting to reach other countries in Southeast Asia.

Dullah still talks about returning to Myanmar, remembering the land he farmed and the cows and buffaloes he owned before his family were forced to flee in 2017. “I want to be able to return and rebuild my life,” he said.

As world leaders met in New York for the UN General Assembly, Bangladesh Prime Minister Tarique Rahman called for a clear roadmap for the safe, voluntary, dignified and sustainable return of Rohingya refugees to Myanmar, alongside continued humanitarian support, protection of civilians and international accountability.

Until that becomes possible, refugee families like Dullah’s remain dependent on an aid system based on calculations of dollars per person, while the choices they face are measured in meals, medicines, school days and the future of their children.

Note: This story was produced with support from Moving Minds Alliance (MMA) through the Reporters for Early Childhood in Humanitarian Crisis (REACH Network) Advocacy Stories Fund

IPS UN Bureau Report

UNITED NATIONS, Sep 28 2026 (IPS) - In the wake of the largest decline in global health financing on record, the Global Leaders Network (GLN) for Women’s, Children’s and Adolescent Health convened a high-level meeting on September 22 to sustain political momentum for women and children’s health financing. The event, Financing for Women’s, Children’s and Adolescent’s Health in a Time of Austerity, was co-hosted by the Governments of South Africa, Spain, and Tanzania, in addition to the Partnership for Maternal, Newborn, and Child Health (PMMCH).

Throughout the meeting, GLN members repeatedly called for a financing reset for women’s, children’s, and adolescent health (WCAH), warning that reduced global assistance and rising debt could reverse decades of progress. In 2025, official development assistance (ODA) fell to USD 174.3 billion, a 23.1 percent drop from 2024 and the largest annual decline on record. Simultaneously, the external debt in low- and middle-income countries reached a record USD 8.9 trillion, with debt-servicing costs remaining at a historic high. The reduction in assistance, with the increase in debt, has limited governments’ abilities to invest in essential services, leading to consequences for WCAH.

In low- and middle-income countries, an estimated 260,000 women died in 2023 from preventable causes related to pregnancy and childbirth. In 2024, an estimated 4.9 million children died before their 5th birthday from deaths that are preventable with low-cost interventions and access to quality health care. Members of the GLN framed this challenge less as finding replacement funds for the declining aid, but instead, governments need to ensure that existing resources are allocated, protected, and used effectively to deliver improvements in WCAH.

“We know that issues of women, children, adolescent health and well-being can’t be solved by ministers of health alone. They need head of state support, they need minister of finance support, and there are always political choices to be made about what we protect when the resources are scarce,” said Helen Clark, chair of the board of the PMNCH and moderator of the meeting.

Dr. Tedros Adhanom Chebreyesus, WHO Director-General, also called for the protection of health budget lines for WCAH, in particular the protection of sexual and reproductive health in humanitarian settings, and stronger accountability and reporting of results. “A policy without a budget is a press release. A commitment without financing is a promise already broken,” he said.

During Tuesday’s meeting, representatives continued to stress the point of investing in primary health care. In particular, the importance of midwives, community health workers, vaccines, medications, nutrition services, clinics, and referral systems that women, children, and adolescents depend upon. Helga Fogstad, Director of the UNICEF Health Programme, urged governments to protect these foundations when preparing the 2027 budgets. Fogstad urged the prioritization of “domestic resources for what has the greatest impact, ensuring essential medicines, vaccines, and nutrition supplies are available where they are needed and investing in enough trained, equipped, and paid healthcare workers to reach every community”.

Diene Keita, Executive Director of UNFPA, stressed the importance of investing in maternal care and family planning: “World leaders and financial experts agree, investing in women and girls delivers unbeatable returns.”

An audience member at the event “Financing for Women’s, Children’s and Adolescents’ Health in a Time of Austerity”, hosted by the Global Leaders Network. Credit: UN Photo/Manuel Elías

Country examples presented during the session illustrated how investing in WCAH has been translated into policy. For example, under Nigeria’s Health Sector Renewal Investment Initiative, Nigeria has moved away from fragmented donor-led programs towards greater country ownership, stronger alignment of resources and accountability for results. Nigeria has already committed nearly $3 billion in domestic health financing over five years in addition to USD 2 billion of US support. The result of this has been revitalizing more than 4,000 primary health centers, retraining 80,000 frontline health workers, a 34 percent increase in deliveries by skilled birth attendants, and a 22 percent reduction in maternal mortality among women delivered in the facilities.

A tension emerged during the session between greater national ownership for countries and the continuing need for international solidarity. Speakers across the board discussed the need for blended finance, pooled funding, and debt-for-health swaps, while institutions like the World Bank and Islamic Development Bank advocated for moving isolated projects into integrated national systems. Issa Faye, Director General for Global Practices and Partnerships at the Islamic Development Bank, stressed how the “challenge now is to help the countries move beyond the short-term responses”.

“We should go away from project by project to really act in a more massive way through the system. We need to talk about the system, not the project,” said Faye.

In closing, the GLN committed to stronger country-led financing, domestic resource mobilization, and appropriately designed financing mechanisms. In addition, donors were called upon to align assistance with countries’ national plans. The focus was that austerity cannot become health austerity; instead, political declarations and financing plans must protect frontline services and lead to a measurable reduction in preventable deaths.

IPS UN Bureau Report