Increasing women’s access to credit through establishment of a village community bank: a case of women at Makulu ward Dodoma (R) District

Jasson, Jane Salomo (2014) Increasing women’s access to credit through establishment of a village community bank: a case of women at Makulu ward Dodoma (R) District. Masters thesis, The Open University of Tanzania.

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Abstract

Women in Tanzania are among the vulnerable groups and are considered to poorer than men counterparts due to low level of education and the existing customary laws that discriminate them in terms of property ownership and inheritance rights. Despite the fact that there have been various efforts by the government, Donor agencies and NGOs in empowering women, still women face problems at the community level due to ignorance of their rights, low level of education and limited employment opportunities to mention few. Therefore various strategies are needed to address women’s challenges especially to women in rural areas where most of services are limited in comparing to urban based women. The Village Community Bank has been established at Dodoma Makulu as an outcome of the CNA which was conducted to identify the economic challenges women are facing and available opportunities. There are author’s varied opinions as to whether microfinance is a tool for poverty reduction and women empowerment or otherwise. Despite the fact that there have been different schools of thoughts on impact of microfinance to poor people and women in particular, both theoretical and empirical literatures indicate that microfinance play a pivotal role in not only in increasing women’s access to credit but also play key role in promoting gender equality, women empowerment and it is also a tool for poverty reduction. It is no doubt that, access to credit alone is not a panacea for women empowerment and hence various strategies are still needed such training on women’s rights and advocacy on discriminatory practices for a meaningful empowerment of women.

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