Extreme poverty is without doubt the greatest challenge facing Mozambique. In 2006, it was ranked as 168th out of 177 countries in the UNDP's Human Development Index, which makes it one of the least developed countries in the world. Paradoxically, all figures show that economic growth in Mozambique has been one of the highest in Africa since peace was established in 1992. However, officials estimate that 70 per cent of the population still live in absolute poverty, the vast majority in rural areas. Average life expectancy is 41.6 years, and only 44 per cent of the country's adult population can read and write. Health services reach only about half of the country's inhabitants, and the AIDS epidemic is creating major social consequences, which are expected to worsen. There are considerable disparities between the capital, Maputo, and other parts of the country, particularly the rural areas in central and northern Mozambique. The economic differences between marginalized groups, workers and farmers, and the urban elite, are visible and growing.
The state of war that prevailed in Mozambique since the mid-1960s, and particularly during the period 1980-92, had a very adverse effect on the country's economic development. In addition, floods caused massive damage to the country's infrastructure and were a major setback to its economic growth in 2000 and 2001.
According to Human Rights Watch, the Mozambican police and prison services are a major source of human rights violations. Arbitrary detention and extortion are common problems. Prisons are overcrowded, and lack running water, food or blankets.
The frailty of justice sector institutions, which combined receive a meagre 0,9% of the annual State Budget, is reflected in their inability to carry out their constitutional mandate. In terms of the criminal flow-of-justice, the incidence of police brutality is exacerbated a number of factors, such as: the scarcity of resources available to justice sector institutions, the low quality of prosecutorial services, the absence of a system of public defence, and the impunity of crime, by dismal prison conditions in which infection and hunger are commonplace and massive suffocation not unheard of.
Mozambique has played a leading role in the support of the international ban on landmines. The country served as co-chair of the Standing Committee of Experts on Mine Clearance and introduced U.N. General Assembly Resolution 54/45B, which was adopted in December 1999. Mozambique also conducted a national landmine survey.
According to the DIHR human rights commitment index, Mozambique has:
- High formal commitment, meaning that Mozambique has ratified major human rights instruments
- Low commitment to civil and political rights (which causes extra-judicial killings/disappearances, torture and ill treatment, detention without trial, unfair trial, lack of participation in political process, lack of freedom of association, lack of freedom of expression, discrimination)
- Low commitment to economic, social and cultural rights (preliminary proportion spent on education and health)
- Medium commitment to elimination of gender discrimination (government employment of women).