Deputy Governor of the Bank of Ghana, Elsie Addo Awadzi is championing calls for more women to open and operate bank accounts as part of efforts to promote Gender Financial Inclusion.
The Deputy Governor who doubles as the Chairperson for the AFI Gender Inclusion Committee maintains that although significant strides have been made in roping women into the financial sector, a lot more needs to be done.
Ghana has been grappling with a wide gap in gender financial inclusion. The Global Findex Database as of 2021 estimates that 63% of women in Ghana have formal financial accounts. This signifies progress in the number of women opening financial accounts. However, the gender gap in account ownership has rather increased in the last five years from 8% to 11%.
While the Global Findex Database estimates 63% for women account ownership, the Alliance for Financial Inclusion’s estimate is relatively significant at 68% compared to 74% for men.
When compared to some neighbors in Africa, Ghana is relatively better. Senegal has the total account ownership for women estimated at 56%, Cote d’Ivoire at 51%.
The regional average is estimated at 55% indicating the progress Ghana has made so far.
However, Elsie Addo Awadzi maintains that the increase in women opening accounts alone is not enough. She notes that while encouraging women to open accounts, the focus should also ensure that they operate those accounts through savings.
The Deputy BoG Governor justifies that getting women to operate those accounts will enable them to build their financial history hence increasing their access to credit. With improved access to credit, women can contribute to the socio-economic development of the country.
“We are seeing that a lot more needs to be done. The conversations are no longer just around more women opening bank accounts but it’s about more women actually using those accounts, whether these are traditional bank accounts or electronic wallets or mobile wallets. We want to see usage, we want to see a high rate of usage,” the deputy governor indicated.
She added, “we want to see more women are beginning to save and to keep this savings number going up. More women are able to access credit because they have the financial history they can leverage to borrow and scale their businesses and create more impact for our economy.”
