Exploring the determinants of the productivity of indian microfinance institutions

Abdul Rashid () and Koire Twaha

Theoretical and Applied Economics, 2013, vol. XX, issue 12(589), 83-96

Abstract: This paper attempts to investigate the determinants of productivity in microfinance institutions (MFIs) in India using the empirical Bayesian technique. To do this, we utilize an unbalanced panel dataset covering the period 2005-2011 with 292 observations from 64 institutions. Based on theoretical grounds, three broad factors are specified: institutional characteristics, outreach, and efficiency. We find convincing evidence that institutional characteristics and outreach have both positive and negative effects on the productivity of MFIs, depending on the proxy used in the analysis. However, the efficiency of MFIs affects the productivity negatively. Specifically, we find that the age of the institution positively influences the productivity by 6.1581 points, while number of offices and number of personnel negatively affect it by 26.41% and 8.77%, respectively. Of the outreach variables, numbers of active borrowers positively influence productivity by 0.04%, whereas average loan size appears to have an inverse relationship with productivity. We further find that cost per loan – a proxy for efficiency, has a negative and statistically significant impact of 1.9604 points on the productivity of MFIs. Overall, our investigation suggests that there is a need to build client confidence and pursue innovative credit delivery techniques in reaching out to the poor and achieving high levels of productivity.

Keywords: productivity; microfinance institutions; efficiency; outreach; empirical Bayesian estimation technique. (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2013
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (7)

Downloads: (external link)
http://store.ectap.ro/articole/934.pdf (application/pdf)
http://www.ectap.ro/articol.php?id=934&rid=105 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:agr:journl:v:xx:y:2013:i:12(589):p:83-96

Access Statistics for this article

Theoretical and Applied Economics is currently edited by Mircea Dinu

More articles in Theoretical and Applied Economics from Asociatia Generala a Economistilor din Romania / Editura Economica Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Mircea Dinu ().