2020 when the country became a secular state. Sudan is a developing country, and ranks 172nd on the Human Development Index as of 2022. Sudan has a lower-middle income economy which largely relies on agriculture due to long-term international sanctions and isolation, as well as a long history of internal instability and factional violence. Over 35% of Sudan's population lives in poverty. Sudan is a member of the United Nations, the Arab League, African Union, COMESA, Non-Aligned Movement and the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation. Etymology The country's name Sudan is a name given historically to the large Sahel region of West Africa to the immediate west of modern-day Sudan. Historically, Sudan referred to both the geographical region, stretching from Senegal on the Atlantic Coast to Northeast Africa and the modern Sudan. The name derives from the Arabic (), or "The Land of the Blacks". The name is one of various toponyms sharing similar etymologies, in reference to the more or less dark skin of the inhabitants. Prior to this, Sudan was known as Nubia and Ta Nehesi or Ta Seti by Ancient Egyptians named for the Nubian and Medjay archers or Bow men. History Prehistoric Sudan (before c. 8000 BC) By the eighth millennium BC, people of a Neolithic culture had settled into a sedentary way of life there in fortified mudbrick villages, where they supplemented hunting and fishing on the Nile with grain gathering and cattle herding. Neolithic peoples created cemeteries such as R12. During the fifth millennium BC, migrations from the drying Sahara brought neolithic people into the Nile Valley along with agriculture. The population that resulted from this cultural and genetic mixing developed a social hierarchy over the next centuries which became the Kingdom of Kush (with the capital at Kerma) at 1700 BC. Anthropological and archaeological research indicate that during the predynastic period Nubia and Nagadan Upper Egypt were ethnically, and culturally nearly identical, and thus, simultaneously evolved systems of pharaonic kingship by 3300 BC. Kingdom of Kush (c. 1070 BC–350 AD) The Kingdom of Kush was an ancient Nubian state centered on the confluences of the Blue Nile and White Nile, and the Atbarah River and the Nile River. It was established after the Bronze Age collapse and the disintegration of the New Kingdom of Egypt, centered at Napata in its early phase. After King Kashta ("the Kushite") invaded Egypt in the eighth century BC,