Incorporating Gender into Poverty Reduction Strategies

This paper explains the rationale for incorporating gender into Poverty Reduction Strategies (PRS) and describes a three-step process for doing so. It analyses available tools and methods for identifying gender issues in poverty analysis and discusses the differences between the poverty constraints faced by women and those faced by men — including differential access to assets, labour markets, financial services, and public goods. The paper argues that gender-neutral poverty strategies systematically underperform and that integrating gender analysis into PRS design is both analytically necessary and practically essential for achieving inclusive poverty reduction outcomes.