Vulnerability and poverty reduction: a review of the literature

With so many people living below or just above the poverty line, there remains significant potential for vulnerability analysis to be better employed in poverty reduction strategies to determine specific measures to break the cycle of poverty.

Vulnerability and vulnerability analysis can deepen our understanding of who is susceptible to environmental stresses and hazards, and why. This was the finding of a recent SEI report by Fiona Miller, Elnora de la Rosa and Maria Bohn from a study that reviewed the attention given to vulnerability to environmental stresses and natural hazards in a number of poverty reduction strategies papers (PRSPs).

While it found that vulnerability is increasingly acknowledged as an important dimension of poverty, there remain some challenges in turning this acknowledgement into action.

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