Socio-economic Impact of IBBL Microfinance on Rural Women in a Selected District of Bangladesh

Abstract

Aims: Rural Development Scheme (RDS) under Islami Bank Bangladesh Limited (IBBL) is an innovative typology of microfinance, envisaged to answer the need of rural poor. This study was planned to reveal the socioeconomic impact of RDS microfinance on the women beneficiaries in a selected district of Bangladesh. Place and Duration of the Study: This study was conducted in the district of Barisal. Data were collected from July to August, 2014. Methodology: This study was mainly based on primary information, however the secondary information was also collected to compare the before and after situation of loan withdrawal. To achieve study objectives data was collected from 206 randomly selected, RDS beneficiary women who engaged with the program for at least one year. Descriptive statistics such as mean, median, mode, standard deviation, etc., were used to describe the selected characteristics of the Original Research Article Jahan and Rashid; AJAEES, 6(3): 136-148, 2015; Article no.AJAEES.2015.071 137 respondents. Z-statistics was employed to compare the before and after situation of loan withdrawal. This study also used OLS regression to see the contribution of selected factor on the improvement of women beneficiaries. Results: The values Z statistics confirmed that highest change was taken place in social capital development followed by yearly income from non-agricultural sources, ownership of sanitary toilet, and ownership of tube-well. In case of social capital highest improvement was found in participation in family-decision making followed by self confidence, and consciousness about self-economic development. OLS regression confirmed that among the eight selected variables three variables, namely the number of earning members per family, the total amount of loan received, and yearly expenditure together can explain 46.5% variation in income growth. Conclusion: This study analyzed both monetary and social impacts of RDS microfinance and arrived at a general conclusion that this program grossly has a remarkable impact on selected socioeconomic aspects of the women clients.