Impact of Microcredit Program on Women Entrepreneurship in Bangladesh: Experience from Society for Social Service

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to explore and measure the influence and impact of microcredit program on women entrepreneurship in developing countries like Bangladesh. The research used 150 questionnaires from women borrowers financed by Society for Social Service, a microfinance institution of Bangladesh. Logistic regression model is used to analyze the results of the study. Under the microcredit program, women borrowers are served with credit and other facilities that influence them for starting and managing their business. Therefore, a huge conversion of economic condition- from ultra-poor (2.7%), poor (55.3%), and middle class (42%) to micro entrepreneur (92.7%), and small and medium entrepreneur (1.3%) is one of the indicators of success of microcredit program. Findings of this study indicate that amount of microcredit significantly impacts the women entrepreneurship, if other factors remain unchanged. Training facilities, supporting environment, tenure of business, capital, and family savings are also considered to be the factors that affect the women entrepreneurs. In this study, only one microfinancing institution is taken as sample firm, therefore care is required when generalizing the results. This paper will give proper guidelines to investigate the area of microcredit in developing countries and facilitate to form the base of future research in the issue of microcredit and women entrepreneurship.