Financial Inclusion, Women, and Building Back Better

Financial inclusion occurs when adults have access to appropriate, affordable, and well-regulated financial services to meet their needs effectively and improve their lives. Financial inclusion is a growing global phenomenon. Since 2011, more than...

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Main Authors: Hess, Jake, Klapper, Leora, Beegle, Kathleen
Format: Brief
Language:English
Published: World Bank, Washington, DC 2021
Subjects:
Online Access:http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/545241624880584363/Financial-Inclusion-Women-and-Building-Back-Better
http://hdl.handle.net/10986/35870
id okr-10986-35870
recordtype oai_dc
spelling okr-10986-358702021-06-30T05:10:56Z Financial Inclusion, Women, and Building Back Better Hess, Jake Klapper, Leora Beegle, Kathleen FINANCIAL INCLUSION SMALL AND MEDIUM-SIZED ENTERPRISES SME FINANCE FINANCIAL SERVICES GENDER INEQUALITY DIGITAL FINANCIAL SERVICES Financial inclusion occurs when adults have access to appropriate, affordable, and well-regulated financial services to meet their needs effectively and improve their lives. Financial inclusion is a growing global phenomenon. Since 2011, more than one billion adults have opened an account at a financial institution, such as a bank or a mobile money provider. Despite the progress, however, women continue to lag behind men. In low- and middle-income economies, men are 9 percentage points more likely than women to have an account, a gender gap that has stubbornly persisted. And there is considerably variation among countries. Responding to the COVID-19 pandemic, governments across the world are providing relief payments and financial support to citizens and businesses. If such transfers could be transacted digitally, this might help unbanked people, especially women, obtain accounts for the first time. Digital government payments are a proven way to boost women’s financial inclusion. Globally, roughly 140 million people, of which 80 million are women, opened their first accounts to receive digital government payments, such as safety net subsidies, public pension funds, or public sector wage payments, according to the Global Findex (Demirguc-Kunt and others 2018). Government COVID-19 relief and recovery payments create opportunities to rectify the gender gap in financial inclusion, mitigate the pandemic’s economic fallout and build resilience against future emergencies. In addition, the momentum brought on by the policy responses to the pandemic offers opportunities to tackle long-standing challenges to financial inclusion. This note outlines critical priority areas toward this goal. 2021-06-29T19:42:34Z 2021-06-29T19:42:34Z 2021-06 Brief http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/545241624880584363/Financial-Inclusion-Women-and-Building-Back-Better http://hdl.handle.net/10986/35870 English CC BY 3.0 IGO http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/igo World Bank World Bank, Washington, DC Publications & Research Publications & Research :: Brief
repository_type Digital Repository
institution_category Foreign Institution
institution Digital Repositories
building World Bank Open Knowledge Repository
collection World Bank
language English
topic FINANCIAL INCLUSION
SMALL AND MEDIUM-SIZED ENTERPRISES
SME FINANCE
FINANCIAL SERVICES
GENDER INEQUALITY
DIGITAL FINANCIAL SERVICES
spellingShingle FINANCIAL INCLUSION
SMALL AND MEDIUM-SIZED ENTERPRISES
SME FINANCE
FINANCIAL SERVICES
GENDER INEQUALITY
DIGITAL FINANCIAL SERVICES
Hess, Jake
Klapper, Leora
Beegle, Kathleen
Financial Inclusion, Women, and Building Back Better
description Financial inclusion occurs when adults have access to appropriate, affordable, and well-regulated financial services to meet their needs effectively and improve their lives. Financial inclusion is a growing global phenomenon. Since 2011, more than one billion adults have opened an account at a financial institution, such as a bank or a mobile money provider. Despite the progress, however, women continue to lag behind men. In low- and middle-income economies, men are 9 percentage points more likely than women to have an account, a gender gap that has stubbornly persisted. And there is considerably variation among countries. Responding to the COVID-19 pandemic, governments across the world are providing relief payments and financial support to citizens and businesses. If such transfers could be transacted digitally, this might help unbanked people, especially women, obtain accounts for the first time. Digital government payments are a proven way to boost women’s financial inclusion. Globally, roughly 140 million people, of which 80 million are women, opened their first accounts to receive digital government payments, such as safety net subsidies, public pension funds, or public sector wage payments, according to the Global Findex (Demirguc-Kunt and others 2018). Government COVID-19 relief and recovery payments create opportunities to rectify the gender gap in financial inclusion, mitigate the pandemic’s economic fallout and build resilience against future emergencies. In addition, the momentum brought on by the policy responses to the pandemic offers opportunities to tackle long-standing challenges to financial inclusion. This note outlines critical priority areas toward this goal.
format Brief
author Hess, Jake
Klapper, Leora
Beegle, Kathleen
author_facet Hess, Jake
Klapper, Leora
Beegle, Kathleen
author_sort Hess, Jake
title Financial Inclusion, Women, and Building Back Better
title_short Financial Inclusion, Women, and Building Back Better
title_full Financial Inclusion, Women, and Building Back Better
title_fullStr Financial Inclusion, Women, and Building Back Better
title_full_unstemmed Financial Inclusion, Women, and Building Back Better
title_sort financial inclusion, women, and building back better
publisher World Bank, Washington, DC
publishDate 2021
url http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/545241624880584363/Financial-Inclusion-Women-and-Building-Back-Better
http://hdl.handle.net/10986/35870
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