There is a broad consensus that economic growth is a prerequisite for sustainable poverty reduction (for example, Ahluwalia et al. 1979; Fields 1989; Demery and Squire 1995; Ravallion and Chen 1997; Dollar and Kraay 2002; Ravallion 2004; Bourguignon 2003; Kraay 2006; Ram 2007). However, the extent to which economic growth can reduce poverty depends on income distribution. Several studies, for example, Ravallion (1997) and Fosu (2009), find supportive evidence from cross-country distributional data that higher initial income inequality is associated with a lower absolute elasticity of poverty to growth in average incomes. Inequality can be a factor detrimental to economic growth, thereby impeding poverty reduction (Alesina and Rodrik 1994; Persson and Tabellini 1994; Deininger and Squire 1998; Bourguignon 2003). It is possible that negative growth can lead to poverty reduction, while positive economic growth can be associated with poverty increase (Son and Kakwani 2008). Growth that is most effective at reducing poverty is not necessarily the same as growth that reduces poverty through decreasing inequality (Warr 2005). In cases where economic growth does not drive poverty reduction, a strategy of propoor growth should be promoted. Economic growth is highly pro-poor when income growth is accompanied by inequality reduction (Klasen 2004, 2008). Regarding empirical studies, findings on the impact of economic growth on poverty reduction are mixed. For example, Wang et al. (2014) measured the pro-poor growth in rural China from 1989 to 2009. They found that during the 1989–۲۰۰۶ period, economic growth in rural China was weakly pro-poor since income distribution deteriorated. However, rural Chinese economic growth was more pro-poor between ۲۰۰۶ and 2009. Fuwa et al. (2015) showed that the main driver of rural poverty reduction has shifted from agricultural to non-agricultural growth in the Philippines. De Silva and Sumarto (2014) found that the poor received proportionately less benefits from economic growth than the non-poor in Indonesia between 2002 and 2012. Ali et al. (2017) found different patterns of pro-poor growth between urban and rural areas in Pakistan between 2001 and 2012. Urban areas experienced propoor growth, while rural areas showed antipoor growth. Using cross-country data, Son and Kakwani (2008) examined the propoorness of growth in 80 low and middleincome countries during the period 1984–۲۰۰۱ and they found that nearly half of the countries experienced pro-poor growth and the remainder experienced antipoor growth. Thus the existing studies show a wide diversity of empirical results, which calls for more empirical studies to better understand pro-poor growth, inequality, and poverty. This study examines the relationship between economic growth, inequality, and poverty reduction in Vietnam during the period 1993–۲۰۰۸٫ We use the decomposition approach of Datt and Ravallion (1991) and Kolenikov and Shorrocks (2005) to analyse the effect of economic growth and inequality on poverty during the 1990s and the 2000s. We also employ Kakwani’s (1980) method to estimate the elasticity of poverty to economic growth and inequality, and Kakwani and Pernia’s (2000) method to calculate changes in the degree of ‘pro-poorness’ over time.