Since 2021, GRID Impact has been working with the Inclusive Financial Systems team at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to examine barriers inhibiting women’s access to and usage of financial services. In this blog, Caroline Morrow discusses the importance of looking at barriers for specific women in specific contexts, shares insights into Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda, and provides reflections from the FinEquity Africa Annual Convening on the way forward. 

Intentionally embedding a gender lens in private investments can help grow women-led MSMEs. As part of the #FinEquity2024 Annual Meeting blog series, we share insights on how integrating a gender lens can yield both financial returns and social progress—with evidence of success from Women’s World Banking Asset Management and Deetken Impact’s Ilu Empowerment Fund. 

To help measure the impact of digitalization programs, Decodis, in partnership with Fundación Capital and Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth, created the Digital Stickiness Index (DSI): a holistic measure that encompasses the different aspects that define the digitalization journey of small businesses. This blog explains how the index works, how it acts as a measure of impact for women-led small businesses and how it can also provide direction to investors, practitioners, and donors seeking to boost women-led small businesses. 

Measuring women’s economic empowerment is key to designing better and more useful financial services for women. This blog shares insights from Women's World Banking, CARE and WEE-Define on how to measure women's economic empowerment and resilience gained by women through financial inclusion programs.

An updated take on "What We're Reading". The FinEquity Africa team brings you a curated list of women's financial inclusion and economic empowerment content we've been consuming recently, from podcasts, new initiatives and articles to videos and social posts. 

FinEquity shares details of its collaboration with DSG Hub, to support the digitization of savings groups, a key priority for FinEquity stakeholders, in particular in Africa.

As part of the #FinEquity2024 Annual Meeting blog series, we reflect on key takeaways from FinEquity Africa 2024 Convening, the first Convening for the FinEquity Africa Community of Practice.

An updated take on "What We're Reading". The FinEquity team brings you a curated list of women's financial inclusion and economic empowerment content we've been consuming recently, from podcasts, new initiatives and articles to videos and social posts. 

The number of countries sharing gender-specific financial data significantly increased from 35 to 83 in 2023, signaling a global commitment to enhancing Gender-Disaggregated Data (GDD). This blog shares global success stories, challenges and lessons learned in gender-disaggregated data utilization. 

In Paraguay, 50% of the workforce is made up of women, with 13% residing in communities with some of the highest poverty rates in the country. In this blog, we learn how Mujeres Transformadoras, an initiative of Fundación Capital is strengthening women's participation in community decision-making, improving their business  skills, and expanding their access to resources in these poor communities.