East Asia and Pacific Gender Innovation Lab

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The East Asia and Pacific Gender Innovation Lab (EAPGIL) runs impact evaluations of development interventions in the region, seeking to generate evidence on what works to close gender gaps and how closing gender gaps can help achieve other development outcomes. This Policy Brief series gives short, non-technical summaries with a focus on key findings and policy implications.

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  • Publication
    Are Mobile Savings the Silver Bullet to Help Women Grow Their Businesses?
    (World Bank, Washington, DC, 2018-09) Bastian, Gautam; Bianchi, Iacopo; Buvinic, Mayra; Goldstein, Markus; Jaluka, Tanvi; Knowles, James; Montalvao, Joao; Witoelar, Firman
    In Tanzania and Indonesia, we promoted the expansion of mobile savings accounts among women micro-entrepreneurs and provided them with business related training. In doing so, we simultaneously relaxed supply- and demand side constraints to savings that women might face. In both countries, the training enhanced the impact of promoting mobile savings. In Indonesia it led women to save more overall, including a nascent use of mobile accounts, and report greater decision making power within the household. In Tanzania, it led to substantially higher mobile savings, new businesses and products, more capital investment, labor effort, and better business practices. However, these short-term impacts have yet to translate into higher business profits. In Indonesia, we observe increased household welfare, but no discernible effects on business outcomes shortly after the training ended. In Tanzania, the increased business investments were not accompanied by greater profitability.