Malaysia is an outlier: richer than its neighbors but doing worse on child nutrition

If we look at income levels across countries in South and Southeast Asia, Malaysia is far richer than many of its neighbors. Its gross domestic product (GDP) per capita has almost doubled since 2000. It is now more than three times higher than that of Cambodia, Laos, and Bangladesh, and more than double that of Indonesia and Vietnam.But if we look at measures of childhood nutrition, Malaysia is not doing better. You can see this in the chart. While its neighbors have made progress on childhood stunting — the share of children under 5 who are too short for their age — Malaysia has regressed. In 2000, 20% of children were “stunted”, and this has increased to 24%.Malaysia also stands out at a global level. When we plot the share of children who are stunted against GDP per capita, the country is a clear outlier for its level of income. Most other countries at this level of economic development have rates below 10%.Malaysia also does relatively poorly on other measures of malnutrition. On childhood wasting — when a child’s weight is too low for their height — it has one of the highest rates in the region.The country is off track or worsening on most global nutrition targets.Read our explainer on stunting: how it’s measured, and why it matters.