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ORIGINAL PAPERhttps://doi.org/10.1007/s10037-026-00290-2Review of Regional ResearchThe Limits of the Role of Economic Growth inPoverty Reduction: Spatial Evidence from BrazilianMunicipalitiesNícolas Volgarine Scaraboto 1 · Luciano Nakabashi 1 · Alexandre Nicolella 1Received: 3 October 2025 / Accepted: 10 July 2026© The Author(s) 2026Abstract Poverty remains a relevant problem in Brazil, potentially hindering theeconomic development of its regions. Applying the poverty convergence approachdevelopedbyRavallion(2012),we analyzethe complexinteractionsbetweenpovertyand economic growth in Brazilian municipalities. Using a dataset from 1991 to 2010,our results reveal a pattern of absolute income convergence across Brazilian munic-ipalities, implying that regions with lower initial income levels tend to experiencehigher subsequent per capita income growth (the advantage of backwardness ef-fect). In addition, we f i nd that per capita income growth reduces the incidence ofpoverty (the advantage of the growth effect). Therefore, poverty should convergeacross Brazilian municipalities. However, the initial incidence of poverty hamperedpoverty convergence by reducing the impact of backwardness and the growth ef-fect. Furthermore, spatial spillovers matter, as income growth in neighboring mu-nicipalities contributes to local poverty reduction; however, high poverty levels insurrounding areas weaken this benef i cial effect. Our results underscore the impor-tance of public policies in addressing and reducing poverty incidence as a strategyto promote economic growth in Brazilian regions.Keywords Poverty Incidence · Economic Growth · Brazilian MunicipalitiesJEL Classif i cation O11;015;I25;C21? Nícolas Volgarine Scarabotonvscaraboto@usp.br? Luciano Nakabashinakabashi@fearp.usp.br? Alexandre Nicolellanicolella@usp.br1Universidade de São Paulo, São Paulo, BrazilK