The global debt crisis

Many of the world's poorest countries are in a deepening debt crisis forced to pay ever higher interest rates to wealthy lenders. Money that should be spent on food, healthcare, education and coping with the climate crisis is flowing out of countries that can least afford it.

Governments across the global south have an impossible choice between serving their people or paying their creditors. Every day this continues, millions are suffering the effects. In Africa, 34 countries spend more on external debt payments than on health or education, when hospitals and schools are already desperately underfunded.

Countries often had no choice but to borrow at extortionately high rates. Often, they have paid their original debt several times over, but the debt will never be cleared because the interest on it keeps growing.

The Bible teaches us that money lending is about accompanying vulnerable people, not about profiteering. But in our current global system, powerful banks make huge profits from the vulnerability of poorer nations.

Low-income countries currently spend an average of 18% of government income servicing foreign debts each year, compared with just 5% in 2024. Research shows that if this was capped at a more sustainable level of around 10%, the funds released could provide clean water to 11 million people, basic sanitation to 23 million and pay for an extra 3 million children to go to school.

There are practical solutions that can make a huge difference to this situation, and, building in the progress made in 2025, the Jubilee Year, we are calling for urgent action in 2026 from the UK government.