Microcredit: an answer to the gender problem in funding?

Sophie Brana

Small Business Economics, 2013, vol. 40, issue 1, 87-100

Abstract: Microfinance institutions (MFIs) target people excluded from the traditional banking system. By providing start-up capital to these under-financed individuals, they enable a greater number of women to start their own business, particularly in sectors where initial capital requirements are high. Our study follows a portfolio of 3,640 microcredit applicants in France over the 2000–2006 time period, identifying MFI client profiles and bringing to light gender differences in borrowers compared to a wider sample of entrepreneurs. This study shows that the male–female gap found amongst company creators is also maintained amongst the clienteles of MFIs. Empirical results also suggest that gender is a decisive factor regarding the amount of credit provided to borrowers when comparing with other factors in the borrower and firm profile. Thus to a certain extent, MFIs are found to reinforce gender inequalities in France. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media, LLC. 2013

Keywords: Microcredit; Gender; Entrepreneurship; Small business; G21; J16; L26; M13 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2013
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (43)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/s11187-011-9346-3 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
Working Paper: Microcredit: an answer to the gender problem in funding? (2010)
Working Paper: Microcredit: an answer to the gender problem in funding? (2008)
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:kap:sbusec:v:40:y:2013:i:1:p:87-100

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer. ... 29/journal/11187/PS2

DOI: 10.1007/s11187-011-9346-3

Access Statistics for this article

Small Business Economics is currently edited by Zoltan J. Acs and David B. Audretsch

More articles in Small Business Economics from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().