Social Impact Assessment of Microfinance Programmes - weman

clients’ amounts to Rs.5.6 million with an average deposit size of Rs.53. The
average deposit size has been falling, even though savings would be expected to
cater for emergencies and investment for lifetime events.
• It is obligatory upon all Kashf clients to take insurance. Insurance charges are 1.5
percent of the loan amount (General Loan) and are taken up-front when the loan is
disbursed. This insurance facility applies in case of accidental or natural death of
the client. Its benefit includes the writing-off of the outstanding loan amount and
the family receives Rs.7,500 to cover for funeral expenses.
• Kashf has brought down its drop out rate considerably. For 2006 it was around 9
percent.
• Since Kashf is one of the oldest MFIs in Pakistan, it is one of those which has
clients in its third cycle and beyond. About a third of Kashf’s sample is in its
fourth (or longer) loan cycle, which makes Kashf one of the best MFIs to
undertake an impact assessment analysis.
• The average Income Per Capita and the Expenditure Per Capita for Active
Borrowers is much higher for Active Borrowers than for all other borrowers. The
value of Household Assets of Active Borrowers are also much higher than all
others. However, as in the case of the targeting of the ‘Official Poor’, i.e., those
below the Official Poverty Line, very few of Kashf’s clients fall below that Line.
• Results showing the perceptions of Borrowers on the impact the programme is
having on them, reveals, as it does in most other MFI cases, that as the number of
loan cycles increase, in general, so does the positive perception about impact.
This is not a surprising result, as one would expect that someone will stay on with
a programme only if their real or perceived quality of life has improved. If they
felt that their lives were not improving, they should have left the programme.
• Most important, however, is the hugely significant improvement in Per Capita
Income, Per Capita Expenditure, Value of Household Assets, etc, which accrues
to Kashf clients compared to those who are new to the programme or do not
belong to it
• Perhaps the most surprising and unexpected results on impact, which relate to not
Kashf alone but to almost all MFIs, relates to the decrease in women’s
empowerment in most cases. Although, there is a significant (positive) difference
at the Women’s Economic Empowerment level between Active Borrowers and
the other three categories, in the case of other types of Empowerment, such as
Income, Assets, Health and Education, we find that those women who have not
joined the programme are ‘better-off’. What this may suggest, is that while
women begin to take decisions related to Economic issues far more
independently, perhaps they compromise the additional income earned by
allowing their spouses/sons to control this income
• The regression results show that Kashf borrowers, both young and old are doing
well with regard to income and expenditure as compared to other respondents and
this has also had a positive impact on assets and schooling of girls. On the other
hand Kashf borrowers do not score well on the empowerment indices, but in
general all individuals who self-select themselves into borrowing have high score
on the indices.
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