When the definition developed by Ravallion and Chen (2003) is used, then growth was pro-poor in all the periods that were studied as measured both by the poverty and the extreme poverty headcount indices. This result can be attributed to the economic stability seen during those years, the real increase in the minimum wage and the implementation of direct income transfer policies (Franga, 2010, Kakwani, Neri and Son, 2010). The results also indicate that these policies are more effective in reducing the extreme poverty headcount than the poverty headcount because, since the extreme poverty line is lower than the poverty line, it is more sensitive to policy measures.