Financial Inclusion and Household Welfare in Burundi: What are the Gender Dynamics?
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Date
2022-10
Authors
Atta-Aidoo J
Matthew, Ester Cosmas
Saleh, Abdulkarim Onah
Bizoza, Saidi
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
African Economic Research Consortium
Abstract
Despite an improving financial inclusion situation across the developing world,
there still exist wide gender gaps in financial inclusion, especially in fragile and post conflict countries. Our study designed and implemented a survey consisting of 860
households across urban and rural Burundi to examine the effect of financial inclusion
on household asset-based welfare from a gendered perspective. The study used the
two-stage least squares (2SLS) regression method to overcome the endogenous nature
of the financial inclusion index. The data revealed that most Burundian households
preferred saving their money at home rather than at a financial institution. Also,
mobile money was mainly employed as a means of receiving and withdrawing cash.
Results from our 2SLS indicate that improved financial inclusion has a greater effect
on the welfare of female-headed households than on male-headed households. This
study recommends developing regulatory and institutional frameworks that can best
encourage higher financial inclusion for female-headed households. Additionally,
there is need for policies that can permit access to credit through the mobile money
platform since that is the widely used financial inclusion avenue for female-headed
households in Burundi.
Description
Keywords
Burundi; Financial inclusion; Gender, Fragile and post-conflict countries; Welfare.