UN peacekeeping contributions
Data > UN peacekeeping contributions
Who supplies the soldiers and police in United Nations missions, month by month from November 1990 to July 2026: 429 months and 162 contributing countries, with Bangladesh's place over time, the 2025-26 cut, and an estimate of what the UN owes countries for their troops. Code and summary tables; the full dataset is rebuilt from the UN's own files.
Download the code and tables (0.9 MB, zip, from Zenodo) · Code and documentation
| Source | United Nations, Peace and Security Data Hub (Department of Peace Operations) |
|---|---|
| Covers | November 1990 to July 2026 (429 months) |
| Size | Summary tables in the download; the full dataset rebuilt by the code has 306,172 rows, one per month, country, mission and personnel category |
| Format | CSV summary tables and charts, with the code that downloads the UN files and rebuilds the full dataset |
| Version | 1.0.0, published 29 October 2026 |
| Licence | Code: MIT. Reimbursement-rate table: CC BY 4.0. The summary tables are made from the UN's figures: credit both this project and the UN. |
| DOI | 10.5281/zenodo.23752306 (all versions) · 10.5281/zenodo.23752307 (this version) |
What it is
The UN has no army of its own. Every peacekeeper is lent by a member country, and for each soldier or police officer serving in a formed unit, the UN pays that country a fixed monthly amount: US$1,448 per person per month from July 2022, rising to US$1,474.68 in July 2026. For some countries this is a large and steady source of foreign income, which is why peacekeeping is sometimes described as a market in which governments supply security for a price.
The UN publishes the monthly numbers as two separate files, with different layouts, category names and gaps between them. This project joins them into one checked monthly series. UN uniformed personnel peaked at 107,805 in April 2015 and stood at 44,819 in July 2026. Between June 2025 and July 2026 the total fell by 16,480 people, or 27 percent. Bangladesh was the largest contributor in 124 months since 1990, more than any other country; in the cut its contingent fell from 5,705 to 4,003, and it slipped to fourth place.
The full UN dataset is not in the download. The UN's terms of use allow its data to be downloaded for personal, non-commercial use but not redistributed. The download therefore holds summary tables, charts, and the code that fetches the UN's files and rebuilds the full dataset on your own computer, with a check that confirms your copy is identical to the one used here.
What it cannot be used to say
- The totals are UN uniformed personnel, as the UN reports them: mostly peacekeeping operations, but also a few political missions and support offices with uniformed personnel.
- The reimbursement estimate is money owed at the standard rate, not cash paid. It leaves out payments for equipment, bonuses and penalties, and the UN often pays countries late.
- Before May 2017, staff officers are counted inside troops, so reimbursement estimates for those years are slightly overstated. Estimates start in July 2014, when the single standard rate began.
- The UN changed its personnel categories over time. The original names are kept alongside one consistent set, and police were not split into individual officers and formed units before November 2009.
- Numbers are kept exactly as published. Twelve rows that give no number count as missing, not zero.
- The series ends in July 2026, the latest month available when it was built.
How it was checked
- Every month from November 1990 to July 2026 is present, with no duplicate rows, and male plus female equals the total wherever both are given.
- Two overlaps in the UN's pre-2010 file were confirmed and removed, and the join between the two UN files has no break: 98,194 in December 2009 and 99,943 in January 2010.
- Every police number matches the UN's separate police file, row by row (51,972 rows, no differences).
- Every month-to-month change of more than 5 percent was listed for review; the large ones match known events.
What is in the download
Summary tables
| File | What it holds |
|---|---|
tables/monthly_totals.csv | All countries combined, by month and personnel category, Nov 1990 to Jul 2026 |
tables/bangladesh_by_year.csv | Bangladesh by year: average personnel, average share of the total, best and worst monthly rank |
tables/top_contributors_latest.csv | The 20 largest contributors in July 2026 |
tables/cut_2025.csv | June 2025 vs July 2026 for the 20 largest contributors of June 2025, plus the total |
tables/reimbursement_estimate.csv | Estimated reimbursement owed by UN fiscal year (July to June), 2014-15 onward, all countries and Bangladesh |
data/reference/reimbursement_rates.csv | The UN's standard reimbursement rates and the General Assembly resolutions that set them |
Columns of the full dataset, rebuilt by the code
| Column | Meaning |
|---|---|
month | Calendar month (YYYY-MM) |
iso3 | Contributing country code (ISO 3166-1 alpha-3), as given by the UN |
country | Contributing country, using the UN's most recent name for that code |
country_as_published | The name exactly as written in the UN file for that month |
mission | Mission acronym, as given by the UN |
category | Harmonised personnel category (below) |
category_as_published | The column or category name used in the UN file |
male, female | Numbers by sex (from January 2010 only) |
total | Number of personnel |
source | Which UN file the row comes from |
Personnel categories
category | Covers |
|---|---|
troops | Soldiers in formed military units |
staff_officers | Military staff officers. Reported separately only from May 2017; before that they are counted inside troops |
experts_on_mission | Military experts and observers ("Observers" before 2010) |
police_individual | Individual police officers |
police_formed_units | Formed police units |
police_unsplit | All police, before November 2009, when the UN did not split individual officers from formed units |
Cite
Azom, Kazi Affnann (2026). peacekeeping-tracker: monthly UN uniformed personnel contributions by country, 1990-2026 (Version v1.0.0) [Software]. Mercenomics. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.23752307
The DOI above is for version 1.0.0. To always point to the latest version, use 10.5281/zenodo.23752306. Found an error? Report it on the Corrections page.