Gender and development: Difference between revisions

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There were numerous case studies done in Tanzania about the correlation of the role of [[Microfinance in Tanzania|SACCoS]] (savings and credit cooperative organization) and the economic development of the country. The research showed that the microfinance policies were not being carried out in the most efficient ways due to exploitation.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Brennan|first=James R.|date=November 2006|journal=The Journal of African History|volume=47|issue=3|pages=389–413|doi=10.1017/S0021853706001794|issn=1469-5138|title=Blood Enemies: Exploitation and Urban Citizenship in the Nationalist Political Thought of Tanzania, 1958–75|s2cid=144117250|url=https://eprints.soas.ac.uk/4155/1/BloodEnemies.pdf}}</ref> One case study went a step further to claim that this financial service could provide a more equal society for women in Tanzania.<ref>{{cite thesis|last=Cooper|first=Lucy-George|date=April 22, 2014|title=The Impact of Microfinance on Female Entrepreneurs in Tanzania|url=https://publications.lakeforest.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1013&context=seniortheses |type=Bachelor's |publisher=Lake Forstest College |oclc=ocn892344250}}{{better source needed|date=April 2023|reason=Per [[WP:SCHOLARSHIP]] only published PhDs are considered reliable sources}}</ref>

While there are such cases in which women were able to lift themselves out of poverty, there are also cases in which women fell into a [[poverty trap]] as they were unable to repay their loans.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2016/11/01/500093608/you-asked-we-answer-can-tiny-loans-lift-women-out-of-poverty|title=You Asked, We Answer: Can Microloans Lift Women Out Of Poverty?|work=NPR.org|access-date=2018-03-01}}</ref> It is even said that microcredit is actually an "anti-developmental" approach.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Bateman, Chang|first=Milford, Ha-Joon|date=2012|title=Microfinance and the Illusion of Development: From Hubris to Nemesis in Thirty Years|url=http://wer.worldeconomicsassociation.org/files/WER-Vol1-No1-Article2-Bateman-and-Chang-v2.pdf|journal=World Economic Review|volume=1|pages=13–36}}</ref> There is little evidence of significant development for these women within the 30 years that the microfinance has been around.<ref>{{cite book|title=Gender, development, and globalization: economics as if all people mattered|last=Benería|first=Lourdes|publisher=New York ; London : Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group|year=2016|isbn=9780415537483|pages=106}}</ref> In South Africa, unemployment is high due to the introduction of microfinance, more so than it was under apartheid.<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Banerjee|first1=Abhijit|last2=Galiani|first2=Sebastian|last3=Levinsohn|first3=Jim|last4=McLaren|first4=Zoë|last5=Woolard|first5=Ingrid|title=Why Has Unemployment Risen in the New South Africa |journal=NBER Working Paper No. 13167 |date=June 2007 |doi=10.3386/w13167|doi-access=free}}</ref> Microcredit intensified poverty in Johannesburg, South Africa as poor communities, mostly women, who needed to repay debt were forced to work in the informal sector.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Cohen|first=Jennifer|date=July 2010|title=How the global economic crisis reaches marginalised workers: the case of street traders in Johannesburg, South Africa|journal=Gender and Development|volume=18|issue=2|pages=277–289|doi=10.1080/13552074.2010.491345|s2cid=154585808}}</ref>

Some arguments that microcredit is not effective insist that the structure of the economy, with large informal and agriculture sectors, do not provide a system in which borrowers can be successful. In Nigeria, where the informal economy is approximately 45–60% of economy, women working within it could not attain access to microcredit because of the high demand for loans triggered by high unemployment rates in the formal sector. This study found Nigerian woman are forced into “the hustle” and enhanced risk of the informal economy, which is unpredictable and contributes to women's inability to repay the loans.<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Madichie|first1=Nnamdi O.|last2=Nkamnebe|first2=Anayo D.|date=2010-06-15|title=Micro-credit for microenterprises?|journal=Gender in Management|volume=25|issue=4|pages=301–319|doi=10.1108/17542411011048173|issn=1754-2413}}</ref>&nbsp; Another example from a study conducted in Arampur, Bangladesh, found that microcredit programs within the agrarian community do not effectively help the borrower pay their loan because the terms of the loan are not compatible with farm work. If was found that MFIs force borrowers to repay before the harvesting season starts and in some cases endure the struggles of sharecropping work that is funded by the loan.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Paprocki|first=Kasia|date=August 2016|title='Selling Our Own Skin:' Social dispossession through microcredit in rural Bangladesh|journal=Geoforum|volume=74|pages=29–38|doi=10.1016/j.geoforum.2016.05.008|issn=0016-7185}}</ref>