Prostitutes deserve to be treated with dignity and enjoy human rights guaranteed to all people by the Constitution, Gauteng Premier Nomvula Mokonyane said on Friday.

This was whether one believed prostitution should be legally discriminated against, Mokonyane told a women's conference in Pretoria.

"The South African Constitution is the ultimate standard against which proposals for reforming the law on prostitution must be measured," she said.

"As women, prostitutes should be afforded those particular human rights that are extended to woman under international treaties and agreements."

Mokonyane said the government was currently revisiting the gender policy, and will in the process be reconsidering the stance on prostitution, as it was "a reality".

Highlighting negative reports about this sort of trade and the impact this had on South Africa, she encouraged people to be open-minded about it as it needed to be looked into.

"We can no longer turn a blind eye and pretend that it's not there, even though we know that men from all echelons of society indeed use prostitutes," said Mokonyane.

She said added that those that were in this trade were doing so because there was no other means of survival for them.

Prostitution and related activities are currently a criminal offence in the country, according to the Sexual Offences Act.

In previous years, the South African Law Reform Commission (SALRC) proposed various options for reforming the law relating to prostitution.

These included among others, the total criminalisation of adult prostitution and regulation of adult prostitution and prostitution-related acts.

However, the commission noted that these options presuppose the criminalisation of under-age, coerced prostitution and trafficking of people for the purpose of prostitution.

Mokonyane said the socioeconomic context in which prostitution occurs and the impact of the current laws relating to prostitution are important considerations in determining the appropriate policy and legislative response.

Significant sections of society find prostitution deeply offensive on religious, cultural and moral grounds.

She said those that acknowledge the need to protect human rights of prostitutes, but would not wish to see them in their residential areas and have their children bump into them, would prefer a legal State-regulated "prostitution zones".

Mokonyane said reports of police officers taking bribes from prostitutes, failing to take seriously incidents of rape and abuse of prostitutes by their clients, undermine not only the sex worker's rights but the overall law enforcement.

"It [also] undermines efforts to improve police capacity, performance and conviction rates."