How many indigenous people are there in the world?

According to the United Nations, there are about 476 million indigenous people living in some 90 countries. That is roughly 6% of the world's population. The figure is an estimate, because countries count indigenous people in different ways and some do not count them at all.

The figure of about 476 million comes from a 2019 study by the International Labour Organization and is used across the United Nations system. Earlier UN documents used a figure of about 370 million. The rise reflects better data more than population growth alone.

Indigenous people make up about 6% of the world's people. The World Bank and the International Labour Organization report that they account for a much larger share, close to one in five, of people living in extreme poverty. They belong to an estimated 5,000 distinct peoples.

The number is hard to pin down. Some national censuses ask people to state their own identity, some use official lists, and some collect no data on ethnicity. Estimates for individual countries can differ widely between governments and indigenous organisations.

Words used here

Sources

• United Nations: Indigenous Peoplesun.org
• World Bank: Indigenous Peoplesworldbank.org
• International Labour Organization: Indigenous and tribal peoplesilo.org

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