However, although a significant amount of work has been conducted on the links between ethnicity and poverty, and also gender and poverty, this work does not sufficiently address the particular and different needs of ethnic minority women. As a result specific information on the extent and experience of ethnic minority women's poverty is more limited.

To begin to address this lack of understanding Fawcett's Seeing Double programme ran a half-day expert seminar in April 2008 with Oxfam GB's Race Equality Programme on ethnic minority women, poverty and inequality. The event was chaired by Michelynn Lafleche, Director of the Runnymede Trust.

Bringing together the main stakeholders with an interest in these issues, the objectives of the seminar were to provide a forum for:

Partnership building and networking: many of the participants, despite each conducting relevant work on ethnic minority women's experiences of poverty, had never been in contact before

Filling evidence gaps: through the course of the afternoon, participants learned about some of the particular issues facing ethnic minority women living in poverty, as well as learning about and from each other's expertise

Generating solutions: building on workshops led by practitioners, the seminar discussion was geared to establishing what best practice interventions look like and how they could be replicated and extended

Seeing Double has published a report and presentations of the Fawcett seminar on 'Ethnic minority women, poverty and inequality' held in partnership with Oxfam GB's Race Equality Programme. Download the report from http://www.fawcettsociety.org.uk/documents/Ethnic%20minority%20women%20and%20poverty%20seminar%20report.pdf

You can also download copies of the presentations given at the event by going to http://www.fawcettsociety.org.uk/index.asp?PageID=717

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