Gender inequality in microcredit access in rural Burkina Faso: an analysis based on the decomposition method

This article analyses gender difference in access to microcredit in rural Burkina Faso. Using 2017 data from the National Land Management Programme, a probit model combined with Fairlie’s (An extension of the Blinder–Oaxaca decomposition technique to logit and probit models. Economic Growth, Center (Yale University), discussion paper no 873., 2003) decomposition method is applied to a sample of 6646 observations. The results indicate that there is indeed gender discrimination in access to microcredit in rural areas in Burkina Faso. This average discrimination is of 0.08 against women. The decomposition indicates that wealth has the largest relative contribution estimated at 22.27% followed by income (21.03%). We suggest that in order to improve women’s access to microcredit in rural areas, policies should further promote women’s economic empowerment. Women’s non-farm entrepreneurship (7.42%) may be a channel to be explored. The robustness of this recommendation has been tested by examining the population of rural people who undertake non-farm activities. We observed that there is no gender discrimination in access to microcredit among non-agricultural entrepreneurs in rural areas.