The impact of table banking on women's economic empowerment in Rarieda Sub-County, Siaya County, Kenya

Abstract

Women‘s economic empowerment plays a big role in social economic development. The government, private institutions and NGOs have institutionalized interventions like table banking to boost women empowerment. This necessitates severe measures to be put in place by banking institutions so as to ease women access to credit taking into consideration the high interest rates and heavy collateral requirements in the market. The lack of affordable credit facilities are some of the reasons attributable to poor performance in women owned small businesses. Indeed, most of the residents of Rarieda Sub- County in Siaya, practice subsistence farming and fishing and therefore live below the poverty line due to minimal economic activities. This economic disempowerment has negatively affected economic status of the residents, majority who are women. This has in turn directly undermined the livelihood of thousands of disadvantaged women in the area. It is therefore imperative to evaluate the effect of the birth of table banking in Rarieda sub-county to ascertain the extent to which it has extended access to financial services to women in this rural community. The main objective of this study was to establish the extent to which table banking has economically empowered the women in Rarieda sub-county. The target groups were mainly women groups in West-Asembo. Stratified random sampling technique was used to get a sample size of 178 respondents. The primary data was collected through self-administered questionnaire and individual interviews were also conducted. The data collected was analyzed using SPSS in terms of the set objectives and discussion of the results of the analysis were as per the objectives. It was hoped that the outcome of the study would positively influence policy decisions regarding women‘s improved access to financial services in the area. The study recommended that the government, private sector and other stakeholders should put in place policies that would streamline, help to govern and entrench ease of financial services such as table banking. Further, it proposes structures with variety of components, including capacity building and technology transfers for the groups to foster not only businesses, but also financial management. Policies and procedures should be put in place to ensure establishment of county gender offices to coordinate, train and nurture table banking groups. This would expose them to new information on markets and market trends in order to help diversify members‘ socioeconomic involvement thereby enhancing their income.