The study is part of a broader project on energy and gender supported by the International Network on Gender and Sustainable Energy (ENERGIA) and the UK Department for International Development (DfID), that has completed an international literature review and scoping studies in Bangladesh, India and Nigeria.

The Government of Indonesia is considering reform of its consumer subsidies for liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) due to their rising fiscal cost: IDR 25 trillion (US$ 1.9 billion) in 2016 – around half of its total energy subsidy expenditure. Subsidized 3kg LPG cylinders are currently available to all citizens. Reforms are likely to target the subsidy to the poor or replace it with cash transfers through the social assistance system.

The impact of energy subsidy reform on the poor has been widely studied. While most subsidy benefits tend to be captured by the wealthy that have the most purchasing power, poor households are most vulnerable because they can least afford higher energy prices. Gender differentiated impacts are, however, poorly understood. In the case of LPG, a household fuel used for cooking, women are likely to be more affected than men because they do most of the cooking and household management.

How subsidy policies affect fuel distribution?

• the extent to which subsidy expenditure flows through into lower retail prices (due to high-level corruption or low-level diversion by black marketeers)?
• the extent to which lower prices influence fuel use?
• the extent to which fuel use affects the lives of women?
• the policy efficiency, which is to say the cost per unit of any positive impacts observed, taking into account the expenditure that is frequently captured by higher-income households?