Microcredit and Women Empowerment: Evidence from Microcredit Clients of the Upper ManyaKrobo Rural Bank in the Eastern Region of Ghana.

2014

English

Women, more than men, are faced with difficulties in accessing financial services. Women in developing countries in particular, face cultural barriers that prevent them from access to credit for productive ventures and are often restricted to the home. As a result, most women in developing countries are poor compared to men. Women’s empowerment brings about women, individually and collectively, becoming aware of how power relations operate in their lives and gaining self-confidence and strength to challenge gender inequalities. When women become empowered, they can become the surest conduit to poverty reduction. This paper assessed the extent to which the Upper Manya Krobo Rural Bank’s microcredit programmed has empowered women clients. The paper is based on a doctoral research output that used structured questionnaire, in-depth interview guide and focus group discussion guide to gather both quantitative and qualitative data from a sample of 420 exits, repeated and permanent microcredit clients. The data was processed and analyzed using SPSS version 16 to generate descriptive results. One of the main findings of the paper is that about 92 percent of the microcredit clients were women and that 93 percent of the clients used microcredit as their main source of business finance. It was also revealed that participating in the microcredit programmed has enables the clients improve on their financial, human, physical and social asset base. The paper noted that non-financial services such as family planning services, business management training, etc. were however withdrawn from the microcredit programmed when the bank achieved self-sufficiency in 2004. The paper recommends that the management of the Upper Manya Krobo Rural Bank re-instate the non-financial service component of the microcredit scheme since it is beneficial to the clients.

KodjoTetteh, E.; Antwi, K. B.; Opareh, N. O.