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on Microfinance |
| By: | Samuel Kobina Annim |
| Abstract: | This study argues that patterns, trends and drivers of the efficiency of microfinance institutions (MFIs) depend on the scope of financial sustainability measures and on MFIs’ inclination to either of the dual objectives of financial systems and outreach. A balanced panel data of 164 MFIs for the period 2004-08 is extracted from the MIX website for the study’s use. Both parametric and non-parametric efficiency estimation techniques are used. Contrary to a trade-off between financial efficiency and outreach, the latter tends to have a positive link with social efficiency. Negative effects of bureaucracies in property registration and lack of credit information on social efficiency are also observed. |
| Date: | 2010 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bwp:bwppap:12710&r=mfd |
| By: | Manojit Bhattacharjee; Meenakshi Rajeev |
| Abstract: | Access by the poor to financial resources on favourable terms and conditions is a necessary prerequisite for achieving any developmental goal for an economy. However, in India, about 50 percent of the population are financially excluded from the formal banking network. These households avail loans from informal lenders, who generally impose unfavourable terms and conditions on the borrower. This paper, based on an in-depth analysis of National Sample Survey Organisation (59th round, All India Debt and Investment Survey, 2003) unit record data, seeks to understand the factors that influence the formation of interest rates in the developed region vis-àvis the less developed ones, as the latter are seen to experience higher rates of interest. Using an ordered logit model, our analysis shows how in the developed regions the lack of monopoly power of lenders brings down interest rate levels. |
| Date: | 2010 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bwp:bwppap:12610&r=mfd |
| By: | Anirudh Krishna; Meri Poghosyan; Narayan Das |
| Abstract: | We develop a framework for assessing community-level development programmes, building upon five related elements that are centrally important: confidence, cohesion, capacity, connections and cash (the five ‘Cs’). We use this framework for evaluating the impacts over a six-year period (2002-2008) of an innovative programme, implemented in rural Bangladesh, which has assisted extremely poor households, literally the poorest of the poor. Asset transfers constitute the centrepiece of this multidimensional programme, which also supports training, organisation building, cash supports, microfinance, and so on. The provision of a substantial dose of assets has helped produce very positive results by and large. Impressive income gains have been achieved (and sustained) by the majority of assisted households. But vulnerability to downturns on account of negative events, such as illnesses and house damage, has resulted in asset losses for several assisted households. Better social protection measures will help complete the good work commenced by the asset transfer plan. |
| Date: | 2010 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bwp:bwppap:13010&r=mfd |
| By: | Rehman Sobhan |
| Abstract: | This paper argues that poverty originates in the structural injustices of a social order which incapacitates the poor from participating in the growth generating sectors of the economy and leaves them captives in the so called informal sector, characterized by low productivity and low earning capacity. In such a system the poor remain individualized and hence disempowered which compels them to interface with the market economy on highly inequitable terms which relegates them to the lowest tiers of the value addition chain. The need for a macro-policy designed to eliminate poverty is premised on the argument that poverty originates in the structural features of society which can only be addressed at the macro-level. Policy interventions, to redesign the structural sources of poverty, bring into consideration issues of social, political as well as economic reform. [Discussion Paper No. 2005/03] |
| Keywords: | Bangladesh, cooperatives, institutions, land, micro-credit, women |
| Date: | 2010 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ess:wpaper:id:3025&r=mfd |