Inez Murray, WWB's Vice President of Technical Assistance and Programs, helped lead the recent three-day workshop "Gender and Microfinance: Enhancing Outreach, Impact and Sustainability," organized by Women's Empowerment Mainstreaming and Networking (WEMAN). The event, held March 5-8 in Bhurban, Pakistan, was sponsored by WWB, Pakistan Poverty Alleviation Fund (PPAF), Khushali Bank and Rural Support Programme Network (RSPN).

In addition to highlighting gender issues in microfinance, the workshop aimed to show industry leaders, including CEOs and COOs, how awareness of such issues can increase the sector's reach and impact. Key topics addressed included whether mandating that 100 percent of borrowers be women ensured empowerment or was taking advantage of women's willingness to endure high transaction costs in order to get loans for their husbands; and reducing transactions costs for borrowers overall and modifying savings products and service delivery mechanisms to maximize product take up. Murray, Shazreh Hussain, Coordinator, WEMAN and Maliha Hussien, Microfinance Consultant, facilitated this in-depth workshop.

Murray's presentation, called "Innovation in Product Development and Marketing," offered WWB's perspective on the empowerment potential of microfinance for poor women. By sharing research that WWB has conducted with its affiliate, Kashf Foundation, in Lahore, Murray illuminated the particular challenges facing low-income women engaged in income generating activities: the "double burden" of housework and growing a business, wage discrimination for those engaged in piece work at home, mobility constraints as well as cultural pressures. Murray then discussed ideas for how credit, savings and insurance products as well as service delivery mechanisms can be sensitized to women's needs and help these enterprising women to achieve their business goals and attend to their most pressing needs, including healthcare, children's education, and housing. Murray concluded by sharing marketing, branding and customer care practices that WWB has pioneered in other markets for reaching and honoring women through microfinance.

In addition to Murray's presentation, the workshop helped practitioners internalize what gender is and why it is critical to understand it if microfinance is to have its desired impact. Several practitioners shared their Best Practice in reaching and impacting women, including the First Microfinance Bank and Tameer Bank. The Pakistan Microfinance Network shared their initiative in tracking social performance and the group agreed to add gender disaggregated product data as indicators. Healthy debates occurred throughout, an action plan was developed and the group planned to convene again for a follow-up workshop in October 2009.

Read media coverage of the workshop (PDF)