 The effect of the growth of microfinance institutions on the percentage of women borrowersL’effet de la croissance des institutions de microfinance sur le pourcentage de femmes emprunteusesVotsoma Djekna ()
Post-Print from HAL Abstract: This article examines the relationship between the percentage of women borrowers and the risk level of microfinance institutions (MFIs), as well as exploring the paradox that a lower percentage of women borrowers in the MFI portfolio appears to be associated with a reduced level of risk. We measured this relationship using panel data from a sample of 508 MFIs operating in 80 countries between 1999 and 2018, employing an OLS regression followed by GMM to confirm our analysis. The results show that a higher percentage of women borrowers is associated with a lower risk in the portfolio. However, the proportion of women among the clientele of MFIs is falling. The analysis shows that this apparent paradox can be explained by a shift in the historical focus of MFIs and an increase in their size: As women have reduced their exposure to risk, institutions have expanded more quickly and been compelled to diversify their clientele. Keywords: Microfinance; Women borrowers; Risk portfolio; Size (search for similar items in EconPapers) Published in Mondes en Développement, 2025, Microfinance : relations entre clients et institutions, N° 52 (4), pp.69-88. ⟨10.3917/med.208.0070⟩ There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it. Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hal:journl:hal-04985163 DOI: 10.3917/med.208.0070 Access Statistics for this paper More papers in Post-Print from HAL |
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