The term pro-poor growth has been debated widely and was influential in development policy-making. As a model of development pro-poor growth was ardently adopted and promoted as a strategy to achieve rapid economic growth but not at the cost of human well-being. However, its twin objectives—faster growth and greater equity—were often not constructively aligned and hence triggered a lot of (un)healthy debates. There is also a lack of clarity or agreement about what the term means or how to measure it, even after decades of debating various notions of pro-poor growth.

The majority of concepts and measures of pro-poor growth are entirely focused on the income dimension of well-being. This notion neglects nonincome dimensions of poverty as well as the multidimensionality of poverty and well-being. N. ...