Financially including Nigerian women could do a lot more learning from how other sectors have achieved marginal progress.
One important mechanism other sectors like the health and education sectors, which have to some extend experienced growth have used is deep understanding of how social norms impact attitudes and behaviors, as compiled from the Consultative Group to Assist the Poor (CGAP), a global financial inclusion partnership organizations .
This has resulted to significant advances in women’s participation and corresponding behavior change by both men and women.
There is therefore need for norm change to spur women financial inclusion in Nigeria, as despite decades-long efforts by financial inclusion development practitioners, women continue to lag behind men in access to formal accounts in Africa’s largest economy.
This is seen in the World Bank’s Global Findex Database, released April 19, 2018, which revealed a widening of the financial inclusion gap between the Nigerian male adults and that of the female in 2017.
According to the data, 51 percent of male adults in Africa’s largest economy had bank accounts in 2017 compared to the 27 percent recorded for female. This signified that the Nigerian male adult were 24 percent more financially included than the female.
Meanwhile, the 24 percent reported in 2017 was 4 percentage points wider than the 20 percent recorded in 2014 when the total male with account was at 54 percent while female was at 34 percent. New insights and approaches are therefore needed to close this gender gap.
A lady from the Northern part of Nigeria by name A’isha said she is not permitted to go open a bank account or even leave the house to go do anything for herself, that she depends on her husband for everything and she was married to take care of the house and the children. This she also said is the culture and the believe of the people from her community.
This was not different from the South East as a woman normally referred to as mama Nkechi, who fries bean cake at a junction in her community said she gives all her money to her husband, that she doesn’t see the need to open an account, since her husband is the head of the family. This is she also said was the same among most of the women in the community.
Social norms therefore refer to the rules and accompanying behaviors that govern social behavior, perceptions, and conduct. Social norms shape how people behave and how people expect others to behave. These informal rules are often highly gendered in that different norms apply to men, women, boys, and girls, and they impact and resonate in varying ways. Gendered social norms permeate actions, perceptions, and expectations at the individual, household, and community level.
Such norms have profound impact on financial inclusion, such as limiting women’s ability to work outside the home, engage with male agents, or even own a phone. Mechanisms to address these kinds of barriers can take different approaches and should be embedded into organizational programs, as gathered from analysts.
Analyst pointed out workarounds for social norms as one important mechanism.
For example, alternative data for credit scoring could be used in markets where women lack access to land for collateral because of norms regarding land ownership and use.
Approaches that are transformational can be long-lasting and impactful. This might include, for example, changing the notion that women should not have access to mobile phones because their household roles do not require them to be informed and connected.
If this is done rightly, analyst see it as a measure to bringing more women into the financial circle, as they make up the larger part of the financially excluded populace of the country.
Meanwhile, the World Bank’s Global Findex Database revealed a slump in the level of financial inclusion in Nigeria in 2017, this is despite the global rising of financial inclusion as reported by the World Bank.
A breakdown of the report shows Nigerian adults who are 25 years and above with bank accounts declined by 5 basis points from 49 percent in 2014 to 44 percent in 2017. This was not different with account holders over 15 years, as the account was down 4 percent basis points from 44 percent in 2014 to 40 percent in 2017, as compiled from the World Bank’s Global Findex Database report released 19, April 2018.
Although, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) have a set target of financially including 80 percent of the Nigerian adults, thereby reducing the excluded to 20 percent by the year 2020.
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