Role of Women Empowerment in Poverty Alleviation: A South Asian Perspective

Abstract

The Millennium Development Goals adopted in the United Nations Millennium Summit of 2000 are eight goals in which poverty eradication is the first goal. The number of people living in extreme poverty has declined by more than half, falling from 1.9 billion in 1990 to 836 million in 2015. The number of people living in extreme poverty in the South Asia Region is likely to have fallen to 13.5 percent of the region’s population in 2015. But in case of South Asian countries, still there is need to remove poverty for sustainable development. For this purpose, present study focused on investigation the role of women empowerment in poverty alleviation in South Asian countries. This study assesses the effects of women empowerment on poverty reduction in case of 6 South Asian countries (Pakistan, India, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal) is taken on the basis of data availability. For this purpose, secondary data on Poverty headcount ratio, ratio of female to male labour force participation rate, ratio of female to male secondary gross enrolment and GDP growth from the year 1990 to 2015 has been taken. The Hausman technique has been used and the results of random effect model shows that in case of South Asian countries economic empowerment of women, social empowerment of women and increase in GDP are important factors for poverty alleviation. On the basis of empirical findings of the present study, it is suggested that government should launch strategies for the economic and social empowerment of females by providing decent environment for the sustainable development of South Asian countries.