WOMEN living in poverty is estimated to have risen by four percent in the Southern Grampians Shire in the five years between 2016 and 2021.

New analysis from the Victorian Council of Social Service (VCOSS) has revealed the shocking reality that 15 per cent of women were deemed to be living in economic disadvantage in the Shire in 2021 after the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) compared census data to 2016 when it was 11 per cent.