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Digital financial inclusion is vital to India’s poor citizens, says Gates
India is poised to lead the world in connecting the poor to bank accounts through mobile phones. This is an ambitious goal. According to the World Bank, only 35% of Indians use formal financial services right now. But India can get to 100%, and if it does hundreds of millions of Indians will be able to create better opportunities for themselves and their families.
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College Credit: How U.S. university students are helping the underbanked build credit in their campus communities
In the U.S., good credit is a basic requirement for entrepreneurs and average consumers alike, and a lack of good credit is a major problem – especially for those with lower incomes. But while service providers are often reluctant to lend to the underbanked, college students across the country are filling the gap with campus microfinance institutions.
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The Power of National Targets in Financial Inclusion: The Alliance for Financial Inclusion discusses their potential and proper use
“National targets” are a familiar concept, and they’ve been used extensively by countries that rely on central planning for socio-economic development. However, many countries have misused the concept, misaligning their capacity and incentives. But Nimal Fernando argues that the process of setting national targets, if carried out right, can advance a country’s efforts toward financial inclusion.
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A Bank Account for All Adults … By 2016: India’s Nachiket Mor committee report has made headlines – will it make an impact?
In India, 40 percent of the population doesn’t have access to financial services. But a Reserve Bank of India committee has recommended providing bank accounts for all Indian adults by 2016 - and it has an intriguing plan for doing so. Some see this as “the starting point for a new financial architecture" in India. Will the impact measure up to the ambition?
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Opinion : Women and the poor are invisible in the Crisil index of financial inclusion in India
Indices such as these are designed to help policymakers and service providers improve financial inclusion, which is often defined as reaching the "unreached". But if the aim is to reach the poor and to reach women, then the figures should give us a break-up by gender
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- South Asia
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Mobile banking without a phone: Here comes the bank van
In Uganda, Rwanda, and the Philippines mobile banking vans reach out to the rural poor as an alternative to cell phone banking schemes.
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Mobile Devices Alone Won’t Solve American Financial Inclusion Problem
Mobile services would alleviate friction and save time for underserved, low-income consumers. But convenience won't necessarily transform the financially excluded into the financially included.
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The High Cost, for the Poor, of Using a Bank
There have been a lot of reports lately on the growing numbers of people without bank accounts, and on those who have accounts but continue to use alternative financial services such as payday loans. All this has convinced policy makers and many consumer advocates that low- and moderate-income people are victims of “financial exclusion.” They have therefore concentrated on moving these people to banks.The numbers of “unbanked” and “underbanked” people are indeed growing. Seventeen million people nationwide are unbanked, up from ten million in 2002; forty-three million are underbanked.
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- banking, cash lenders, unbanked
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