Rural Finance and Investment Insights: November 2022

Note from the editor

Women play an important role in fishery value chain activities. There are 45 million women who participate in the small-scale fisheries value chain, representing 40 percent of the estimated labour force engaged in small-scale fisheries (SSF). Although women’s contribution to SSF is economically and socially important, it receives minimal attention while formulating fisheries policies and programs.

On November 11, the Global Network for Capacity Building to Increase Access of Small-scale Fisheries to Financial services (CAFI-SSF Network) in association with other partners organized a webinar “Access to finance for empowering women in small-scale fisheries value chain“. The webinar shared information on successful policy initiatives to enhance the livelihood of women self-help groups practising small-scale fish rearing activities in village community ponds, with collective community action being implemented for catfish production to processing activities. It also introduced how women-member-based fisher- folk associations supported equitable access to inclusive financial services programs for women in small-scale fisheries value chains in Asia and Africa region.

For more details of the webinar, please find the press coverage and recording here.

Leading the charge for rural women’s empowerment in Niger

The blog introduces how women’s life has changed and got economically empowered by Dimitra clubs, voluntary discussion groups that bring women, men and young people together to bring about change in their own communities.

The significance of informal finance for MSEs

This discussion will look at the significance of informal finance for MSEs and people in low-income countries: why they still use informal financial services in spite of flexible formal financial options, whether both types of services should be available, and what formalizing informal finance means for MSEs.

Promoting access to agricultural finance for youth in developing countries

The study makes use of the latest and most relevant literature on youth finance, while also relying extensively on insights and case studies that have emerged during the development of a series of FAO country-level assessments on the state of agricultural finance for youth

How Do Transaction Costs Influence Remittances

The paper investigates the elasticity of remittances to transaction costs in a high-frequency and dynamic setting. The findings suggest that cost reductions have a short-term positive impact on remittances, that dissipates beyond one quarter.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=2N-SckwNKMg

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