Female smallholder farmers’ preferences for digital and conventional credit attributes: evidence from Madagascar

What is it about?

Digital credit is spreading rapidly across Sub-Saharan Africa and holds potential for financial inclusion and female financial autonomy. We conduct a Discrete Choice Experiment with 420 smallholder farmers in Madagascar to assess gendered preferences for selected digital and conventional credit attributes. The demand of female respondents is higher than that of males, suggesting that they might be underserved. However, differences in willingness to pay for the credit attributes are mostly not statistically significant, indicating that designing gender-specific services may not be advisable.

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