The Challenge

It is widely understood that financial services and structures can have huge impacts on the economic empowerment and livelihoods of women and the well-being of their families, particularly when those services are made accessible directly to the women themselves, and not through their husbands and other power holders in their families. Equal participation in decision making at household level coupled with access to bank accounts increases women’s capacity and likelihood to save, reduces their risk of loss of income and improves their financial stability and resilience to shocks. Yet despite numerous interventions to increase women’s access to such services, there has been a shortage of financial products and systems designed to meet women’s specific financial behaviors and needs, or to address the gender norms that impact their access and use of bank products and other financial services.