Sustainable Empowerment Initiatives among Rural Women through Microcredit Borrowings in Bangladesh

Abstract

Microcredit is an effective instrument that has been recognized to alleviate poverty, especially in developing countries such as Bangladesh. This study seeks to use microcredit as an instrument to bridge the gap between the accessibility of microcredit among poor rural women and sustainable socio-economic development, providing novelty to the concept of “sustainability of empowerment”. In addition, this study employed poor rural women to estimate the empowerment performance of microcredit borrowers compared to non-borrowers in the same socio-economic environment as it relates to microcredit in rural Bangladesh. A regression analysis was used to accomplish these objectives. This study also used propensity score matching techniques to find an easy way to access microcredit. The empirical results not only involve participation in microcredit accessibility but also the particular qualitative attributes of women empowerment. The results also suggest that sustainability is accompanied by affluence among microcredit borrowers, as indicated by women empowerment. The outcome of the empirical analysis shows that there is a significant impact of microcredit on increasing participation in the overall decision-making process, in legal awareness, independent movements, and mobility, as well as enhancing living standards to encourage sustainable women empowerment. This study recommends future investigations for microcredit providers to explore how to build an integrated, holistic approach to women empowerment in Bangladesh.

Micro-credit for the Small Enterprises Development: A Case of Kaski District, Nepal

“…The efficiency of micro-credits for small businesses can be assessed by various criteria such as the growth rate of firms, their productivity, profitability, income and net assets, poverty reduction, and women's empowerment (Yang, 2018;Akhter & Cheng, 2020). The micro-entrepreneurs need financing for their survival but they do not care whether the financing comes from family, friends or a particular financial institution (Mor et al, 2020).…”

Microcredits for Sustainable Development of Small Ukrainian Enterprises: Efficiency, Accessibility, and Government Contribution

“…Considering the existing methodological approaches to assessing the efficiency of microcredits for small businesses, it should be noted that there are various criteria for such an assessment. Criteria such as the growth rate of firms [20], their productivity [21], profitability [22], income and net assets [23], poverty reduction [24], women's empowerment [25,26], and so on are applied.…”

Micro‐credit NGOs and strategic trust: An odd couple?

“…Many non‐governmental organizations (NGOs) around the world regard micro‐credit as a favored method of affecting positive social change (Yip & Bocken, 2018). Micro‐credit is a program that gives the poorest women uncollateralized loans (Akhter & Cheng, 2020; Gutiérrez‐Nieto & Serrano‐Cinca, 2019). Thus, it promotes financial inclusion, which seeks to provide historically unbankable populations access to financial goods and services (Yip & Bocken, 2018).…”

“…

Though conventional financial institutions are closely associated with sustainable banking-defined as the delivery of "financial products and services, which are developed to meet the needs of people and safeguard the environment while generating profit" (Yip & Bocken, 2018, p. 150), there are specialized institutions that conduct micro-credit programs, which are a more socially extended aspect of sustainable banking (Weber, 2012). Many non-governmental organizations (NGOs) around the world regard micro-credit as a favored method of affecting positive social change (Yip & Bocken, 2018).Micro-credit is a program that gives the poorest women uncollateralized loans (Akhter & Cheng, 2020;Gutiérrez-Nieto & Serrano-Cinca, 2019). Thus, it promotes financial inclusion, which seeks to provide historically unbankable populations access to financial goods and services (Yip & Bocken, 2018).

…”

“…Micro-credit is a program that gives the poorest women uncollateralized loans (Akhter & Cheng, 2020;Gutiérrez-Nieto & Serrano-Cinca, 2019). Thus, it promotes financial inclusion, which seeks to provide historically unbankable populations access to financial goods and services (Yip & Bocken, 2018).…”