The reach of micro-credit amongst poor women in rural Bangladesh has been considerable and it has served to alleviate poverty with an added advantage of empowering women to some extent in household situations. If, in addition to this basically livelihood lifeline, women's access to SME can be expanded, they will get a ladder to climb to entrepreneurial ranks in the economy.
Given the pioneering successes of some enterprising women in industry and business despite daunting odds, and also the fact that they are good, responsible managers of money, the government earmarked 10 per cent of SME funds for women. Resultantly, we see more women gaining access to bank loans under a central bank's refinancing scheme. Only two years ago, there was one female SME loanee, but since the inception of the programme in 2004 the number has soared to 498. Statistically this may sound impressive; but quite evidently, we have a long way to go before the banks' SME clientele assumes a size they can be proud of.
Basically, lack of credit has been preventing Bangladeshi women from starting or expanding their businesses. They have been conventionally denied loans for lacking in colateral. But now we believe the banks of their own should come forward to increase their lending to women under different schemes. The seed funds were provided by the central bank, International Development Association (IDA) and Asian Development Bank. Now all that the banks need to do is to build on the core element to facilitate rapid growth in women's participation in trade, commerce and productive sectors.
So, we look forward to a revitalised and liberalised SME scheme under which the banks' preference for lending to the medium enterprises will be somewhat bent towards funding small businesses where, according to a women's forum leader, the need for credit is greater.