Open Access Journal Article

Access to and use of financial services in ECOWAS countries: Is mobile money closing the gender gap?

by Aristide Bonsdaouêndé Valea a,* orcid
a
Centre Universitaire de Dori, Université Thomas Sankara, Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso
*
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
EAL  2024, 50; 3(1), 50; https://doi.org/10.58567/eal03010007
Received: 17 August 2023 / Accepted: 24 September 2023 / Published Online: 15 March 2024
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Abstract

This paper deals with the gender gap in accessing and using financial services provided by mobile money and financial institutions. Using data from ECOWAS member countries, we applied the Fairlie decomposition method to estimate and decompose the gender gap. The results show that mobile money contributes to improving of the use of services compared to financial institutions. However, it also increases the gender gap in women's disadvantages in accessing and using these services. The difference in the level of education and income between males and females is the main factor explaining the gender gap.

Keywords: Gender gap; mobile money; financial inclusion; Fairlie decomposition; ECOWAS;
Copyright: © 2024 by Valea. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY) (Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

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ACS Style
Valea, A. B. Access to and use of financial services in ECOWAS countries: Is mobile money closing the gender gap?. Economic Analysis Letters, 2024, 3, 50. https://doi.org/10.58567/eal03010007
AMA Style
Valea A B. Access to and use of financial services in ECOWAS countries: Is mobile money closing the gender gap?. Economic Analysis Letters; 2024, 3(1):50. https://doi.org/10.58567/eal03010007
Chicago/Turabian Style
Valea, Aristide B. 2024. "Access to and use of financial services in ECOWAS countries: Is mobile money closing the gender gap?" Economic Analysis Letters 3, no.1:50. https://doi.org/10.58567/eal03010007
APA style
Valea, A. B. (2024). Access to and use of financial services in ECOWAS countries: Is mobile money closing the gender gap?. Economic Analysis Letters, 3(1), 50. https://doi.org/10.58567/eal03010007

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