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Women, Inclusive Finance and the Quality of Life: Evidence from Zambia

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Women and Sustainable Human Development

Part of the book series: Gender, Development and Social Change ((GDSC))

Abstract

The United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goal on gender equality seeks to achieve equal rights to economic resources, including financial services. This chapter uses the FinScope surveys of 2015 to investigate the gap between male and female use of formal financial services in Zambia, its predictors and the implications on the quality of life of households, following financial sector reforms in the country. The results show that fewer women use formal financial services compared to men, accounted for by education, location and source of income. Financially included female-headed households enjoy a significantly better quality of life than financially excluded female-headed households. There is, however, no such difference, when financially included female-headed households are compared to financially included male-headed households, evidence that access to and use of finance can reduce gender inequality in wealth.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    See UNDP Support to the Integration of Gender Equality across the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) Including Goal 5. http://nbsapforum.net/sites/default/files/5_Gender_Equality_digital.pdf.

  2. 2.

    See United Nations (2016). Metadata on Sustainable Development Goal 5.

  3. 3.

    See United Nations (2009). World Survey on the Role of Women in Development. Women’s Control over Economic Resources and Access to Financial Resources, Including Microfinance. ST/ESA/326.

  4. 4.

    For more details on this marriage arrangement and its implications, see http://www.divorcelaws.co.za/marriage-in-community-of-property.html#.

  5. 5.

    See Alliance for Financial Inclusion (2013).

  6. 6.

    For more details on these social schemes, see Tesliuc et al. (2013).

  7. 7.

    See Heckman et al. (1997) for the technical details of these matching algorithms.

  8. 8.

    See Wittenberg and Leibbrandt (2017) for an overview of the superiority of this approach, for purposes of this study, compared to the conventional principal component approach by Filmer and Pritchett (1998).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Stellenbosch University, Cape Town, South Africa

    Lwanga Elizabeth Nanziri

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  1. Lwanga Elizabeth Nanziri
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Correspondence to Lwanga Elizabeth Nanziri .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. United Nations University (UNU-MERIT), Maastricht, The Netherlands

    Maty Konte  & Nyasha Tirivayi  & 

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Nanziri, L.E. (2020). Women, Inclusive Finance and the Quality of Life: Evidence from Zambia. In: Konte, M., Tirivayi, N. (eds) Women and Sustainable Human Development. Gender, Development and Social Change. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-14935-2_16

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