Enhancing the Economic Empowerment of Women through Financial Inclusion
This morning a group of women from various backgrounds in business, government, and the education sector, came together to take part in a workshop on empowering themselves through financial inclusion. Since 2010, more than fifty-five countries have made commitments to financial inclusion, and more than sixty have either launched or are developing a national strategy. When countries take a strategic approach and develop national financial inclusion strategies that bring together financial regulators and other stakeholders they increase the pace and impact of reforms. News Five’s Isani Cayetano reports on the event at the Radisson in Belize City.
Isani Cayetano, Reporting
The availability and equality of opportunities to access appropriate, affordable, and timely financial products and services is known as financial inclusion, a key enabler to reducing poverty and boosting prosperity. These services include banking, loan, equity, and insurance products. Financial inclusion facilitates day-to-day living, and helps families and businesses plan for everything from long-term goals to unexpected emergencies. Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, men and women were adversely affected by the ensuing economic crisis. To embolden women, an initiative has been undertaken by the Taiwanese government, as well as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Chris McGann
Chris McGann, Managing Director, PPF Capital
“This workshop was organized through the Republic of China, Taiwan and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs under a project that they’re looking at, female empowerment in Latin America and the Caribbean and it is in direct response to the COVID-19 crisis which actually caused serious negative economic impacts for Latin America and the Caribbean which was much more significant in the Caribbean.”
The ongoing COVID-19 crisis has also reinforced the need for increased digital financial inclusion involves the deployment of the cost-saving digital means to reach currently financially excluded and underserved populations. This morning, a handful of women attended a seminar organized by PPF Capital.
Vicky Menjivar
Vicky Menjivar, Analyst, PPF Capital
“It’s a great privilege and honor to organize an event like this one. Our team put together this event for women and it was led by a woman. So I think that having all these women in person here at Radisson but also online attend this event and bring awareness to an issue like this, financial inclusion, it truly means a lot to bring this issue to the forefront.”
A cross-section of participants from government and the private sector, as well as women in academia, attended the workshop. Financial inclusion has been identified as an enabler for seven of the seventeen Sustainable Development Goals.
Chris McGann
“It’s been eye-opening for a lot of people. We have some interesting panel discussions. Yesterday we looked at it from a policy perspective, sustainable development and how financial inclusion ties into sustainable development. Eye-opening for a lot of people when we look at the data. A lot of the data, we have one-shot studies so there’s the National Financial Inclusion Strategy that has a lot of the data that we are looking at and others that look at employment, education, access to finance, access to credit and these kinds of things and just the lack of data that there is. I think generally, we need to improve the data environment in Belize to inform policy decisions and private sector investment decisions.”
Countries with high mobile money account ownership had less gender inequality. Between 2011 and 2017, gender gap in account ownership remained stuck at nine percentage points in developing countries, hindering women from being able to effectively control their financial lives. The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on this gender gap remains to be seen.
Isani Cayetano for News Five.
