Bank of Ghana to develop gender-specific financial policy

The Bank of Ghana is set to develop gender-specific policies to encourage the use of financial services among vulnerable groups like women. This was made known at the just-ended Women & Digital Finance webinar organized by the Africa Centre for Media & Financial Literacy via Zoom.

The event which was under the theme: “Fostering Women’s Financial Inclusion and Empowerment; the role of regulation and financial technology” brought together over 50 participants from diverse backgrounds to discuss and inspire gender-differentiated approaches to supporting women use of digital financial technologies and services.

Speaking at the event, Madam Clarissa Kudowor of the Payment Systems Department of Bank of Ghana, indicated that the BoG is committed to putting in place measures to address the persistent gender gap in the usage of financial services.

She said in the absence of a policy framework, the Central Bank has “initiated a process to develop sex-disaggregated measurement tools and also develop a new industry-wide data collection portal to collect sex-disaggregated data from all regulated institutions.” The BoG hopes to develop a gender-specific policy framework to guide the usage of digital financial services among women.

The Products and Platforms Manager of DreamOval, Asiedua Debrah-Apomah, also shared insight on the benefit of digital payments and its contribution to the financial inclusion agenda. She indicated that the usage of financial services among women contributes significantly to women economic empowerment. She, therefore, encouraged product managers within the financial sector to take into consideration the unique needs of the financially excluded when developing financial products.

The Women in Digital Finance Forum is an initiative of the Africa Centre for Media & Financial Literacy; with the aim to rally digital finance practitioners, academics, women groups and policymakers to deliberate, share ideas and develop strategies that address the persistent gender gaps in the access and usage of digital finance services among women in Africa.