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Assessing the Efficacy of Government Intervention Mechanism on Financial Inclusion Initiatives in the Philippines and Their Implications on Economic Disparities
... Anabe-Aducon (2019) highlighted that local government financial management played a pivotal role in determining how effectively MSMEs could leverage these supports, as improved financial management at the local level facilitated better access to marketing and innovation resources. Additionally, Reyes-Garcia et al. (2024) added that financial inclusion initiatives, especially in underserved areas, empowered MSMEs by enhancing their access to the financial resources necessary for expanding their market reach. Ultimately, the interplay between government support and market development was critical for fostering income growth among rural MSMEs, directly correlating with their marketing and overall growth potential (Duan & Zheng, 2024). ...
Branding creates a unique identity that resonates with consumers' emotions and values, enabling small businesses to thrive globally, with initiatives like One Town One Product (OTOP) balancing local authenticity and international appeal. Local brands act as cultural ambassadors, enhancing national identity and driving economic growth, while consumer ethnocentrism fosters loyalty to local products. Government support plays a key role in fostering innovation and expanding market opportunities for MSMEs. This study explores the impact of marketing strategies and government support on local businesses and community development, using a descriptive-correlational design with data from 50 MSME owners or managers in Camarines Sur. The findings led to the development of the APPA Model, "Assessing Products and Profit Advancement," which provides two integrable marketing strategies for MSMEs and governments, emphasizing sustainability, flexibility, and modern principles. The model's spiral-shaped design highlights priorities, balancing cost-efficient strategies
with actionable forecasted data for businesses and focusing on subsidization, regulation, and infrastructure for governments. It encourages adaptation, ethical practices, and competitive advantages for sustainable growth. Local governments support MSMEs by addressing financial disparities through accessible financing options like microloans, grants, and subsidies, enabling businesses to invest in marketing, infrastructure, and operations. Tailored support, such as mentorship and networking, helps newer businesses establish a market presence. Strategic policies, streamlined processes, and infrastructure investment boost MSME competitiveness, promoting long-term economic growth. The APPA Model fosters a collaborative ecosystem for sustainable local enterprise development by aligning resources with business needs.
This study analyzes the impact of financial inclusion on economic growth in 104 developing countries from 2004-2019. We construct a novel composite financial inclusion index and apply the dynamic panel estimation technique to examine the impact of financial inclusion. The results indicate that financial inclusion positively correlates with economic growth in developing countries but not in high-income countries. This study shows that financial inclusion affects economic growth primarily by expanding opportunities for lower-income people. With increased financial access, those in the lower-income bracket can expand their economic activity, which results in economic growth in developing countries. In high-income countries, access to financial services is already high, and financial inclusion may not offer new opportunities to a larger segment of the population. The study also compares financial inclusion and financial development. The results suggest that financial inclusion contributes to financial development in developing countries by enhancing access to financial services. The findings recommend that policymakers in developing countries may use financial inclusion to increase economic growth.
This study examines the influence of financial inclusion on inclusive economic growth in Indonesia using data from 34 provinces. Financial inclusion is measured using the number of bank branch offices, the ratio of credit savings to GRDP, and third-party funds. Meanwhile, economic growth is described by the logarithmic variable of the difference in GRDP per capita. Secondary data from the Central Statistics Agency (BPS) and the Financial Services Authority (OJK) are used in this study. According to the statistical panel regression estimation results, the savings ratio per GRDP and third-party funds significantly positively affect inclusive economic growth. In contrast, the number of bank branch offices has no significant effect on inclusive economic growth.
Financial inclusion is a condition that people have equal access to and use financial services. However, in 2021, Indonesia will have the fourth-highest proportion of unbanked citizens worldwide. Economic growth may have an indirect or direct impact on poverty depending on financial inclusion. Several variables that encourage financial inclusion have been described by many studies. This study aims to analyze simultaneous equation models using panel data of financial inclusion, then identify its causality relationship with economic growth and poverty of 33 provinces in Indonesia from 2011-2021. As result, only the variable mean years of school has an effect on increasing of financial inclusion index. The three variables of economic development, namely financial inclusion, economic growth, and poverty have a one-way causality relationship. That is means there has been no visible development synergy in terms of financial inclusion, economic growth, and poverty. It could be an example given to the government in evaluating Indonesia's regional development gap.
Financial inclusion is increasingly seen as a key enabler of various development objectives. While not explicitly one of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), financial inclusion is recognized as an important enabler for them. The Philippine central bank—the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP)—has even identified financial inclusion as a “national development agenda” that requires a conscious effort by various sectors to accelerate and enable its societal benefits. This paper studies the relationship between financial literacy and financial inclusion in the Philippines using data gathered from the 2019 Financial Inclusion Survey (FIS). We apply ownership of financial account and use of financial services as indicators of financial inclusion. Based on the results, financial literacy is a positive driver of financial inclusion. We calculated that a one-standard-deviation increase in financial literacy scores increased the likelihood of holding at least one account by 3.7 to 4.2 percentage points. On the other hand, a one-point increase in financial literacy scores improved the likelihood of availing of a financial service by 4.9 to 6.0 percentage points. The other drivers of owning at least one formal account and availing of financial services are age, gender, employment status, awareness of BSP’s programs, income above 40,000 PHP, and being the main household financial decision-maker. This paper aims to promote BSP’s agenda to bridge the financial inclusion gap and raise financial literacy levels in the country. With this study, the authors second BSP’s advocacy that financial inclusion is one of the instruments to attain sustainable and equitable development in the Philippines.
One of the satellite cities in Surabaya is Citraland which has been established since 1993 as one of the largest real estate companies in Surabaya. The development of satellite cities which are synonymous with luxury housing has had its own impact, namely there has been a gap with the surrounding area. region and economic disparity (Adisasmita, 2005). Basically housing construction has an impact on economic disparities in the surrounding community. In addition, it also creates an increasingly widening welfare gap between low and high income groups which is measured by income inequality. The method used in this research is literature study. The results of this study are three factors that cause economic inequality, namely first, there is a high disparity related to the income of rural communities and housing; second, there are differences in daily lifestyles; third, differences in geographical conditions/environment of residence.
The importance of an inclusive financial system is considered a priority all over the world. The importance of financial inclusion raised from the problem of financial exclusion were most of the Middle east and North Africa (MENA) region countries didn’t have enough formal financial services and most of the population didn’t have access to formal bank accounts. Financial inclusion not only helps individuals and families, but collectively it develops entire communities and can help drive economic development. The purpose of this study is to assess the effects of financial inclusion on economic development in the MENA region. The aim of this study is to investigate the impact of financial inclusion on the economic development of MENA region countries. To achieve this aim, a three-dimension Financial Inclusion Index (FII) was created using Principal Component Analysis (PCA) to measure each country’s level of financial inclusion. These dimensions are access, usage, and quality of financial services. Data was collected from 18 MENA region countries using a sample period from 2004-2019. Based on a 2-step Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) system, the results showed that an increase in the level of financial inclusion leads to the increase of MENA region countries’ economic development.
Financial inclusion is critical to inclusive growth, proffering policy solutions to eradicate the barriers that exclude individuals from financial markets. This study explores the effects of financial inclusion on economic growth in a global perspective with a large number of panels classified by income and regional levels from 2002–2020. The analysis begins with the development of a comprehensive composite financial inclusion index comprised of penetration, availability, and usage of financial services and the estimation of heterogeneous panel data models augmented with well-known variables. The results obtained from the panel cointegration test support a long-run relationship between economic growth, financial inclusion, and the control variables in the full panel, income-level, and regional-level economies. Furthermore, the study employs a GMM (generalized method of moment) approach using System-GMM estimators to examine the effects of financial inclusion and the control predictors on economic growth. The results of the GMM model clearly indicate that financial inclusion has a significantly positive impact on economic growth across all panels, implying that financial inclusion is an effective tool in fostering rapid economic growth in the world. Finally, the study delves into the causality relationship between the predictors and provides statistical evidence of bidirectional causality between economic growth and financial inclusion, whereas it only supports unidirectional causality relationships from credit to the private sector, foreign direct investment, inflation rate, the rule of law, school enrollment ratio, and trade openness with no feedback causality. Moreover, the study fails to provide causality evidence from the age dependency ratio and population to economic growth.
The government has supported the innovation of private firms by intervening the market for various purposes, such as preventing market failure, alleviating information asymmetry, and allocating resources efficiently. Although the government's R&D budget increased rapidly in the 2000s, it is not clear whether the government intervention has made desirable impact on the market. To address this, the current study attempts to explore this issue by doing a systematic literature review on foreign and domestic papers in an integrated way. In total, 168 studies are analyzed using contents analysis approach and various lens, such as policy additionality, policy tools, firm size, unit of analysis, data and method, are adopted for analysis. Overlapping policy target, time lag between government intervention and policy effects, non-linearity of financial supports, interference between different polices, and out-dated R&D tax incentive system are reported as factors hampering the effect of the government intervention. Many policy prescriptions, such as program evaluation indices reflecting behavioral additionality, an introduction of policy mix and evidence-based policy using machine learning, are suggested to improve these hurdles.
When Covid-19 appeared in the USA at the beginning of 2020, there was no treatment or vaccine. The only way to deal with the virus was containment, which resulted in business and agency closures. The impact on the economy was enormous, particularly on the lives of minorities and financially vulnerable people. The present study investigated the impact of COVID-19 on the lives of vulnerable people through qualitative interviews of major social service and healthcare agencies. The results show how the pandemic furthered existing disparities in access to a variety of services and supports.
Financial inclusion is a central theme in development policy. While it involves changes at the individual level and comprises several interrelated financial activities, most existing measures rely on macroeconomic variables. We construct an alternative index of financial inclusion using the World Bank Findex—a microdata dataset with 451,372 observations. Applying it, we first analyse the socio‐economic determinants of financial inclusion. Second, we propose a new country ranking of financial inclusion. Our findings comprise three features. First, we do not find evidence of a gender gap in low‐ and middle‐income countries. Second, richer individuals display higher levels of financial inclusion. Third, countries with high self‐employment rates exhibit lower levels of financial inclusion. Our results suggest that financial inclusion is more related to income and employment status than gender disparities, which could lead to a different approach from policymakers on promoting the inclusion of the poor into the formal financial system.
Introduction
Early intervention services for psychosis (EIS) are associated with improved clinical and economic outcomes. In Quebec, clinicians led the development of EIS from the late 1980s until 2017 when the provincial government announced EIS-specific funding, implementation support and provincial standards. This provides an interesting context to understand the impacts of policy commitments on EIS. Our primary objective was to describe the implementation of EIS three years after this increased political involvement.
Methods
This cross-sectional descriptive study was conducted in 2020 through a 161-question online survey, modeled after our team's earlier surveys, on the following themes: program characteristics, accessibility, program operations, clinical services, training/supervision, and quality assurance. Descriptive statistics were performed. When relevant, we compared data on programs founded before and after 2017.
Results
Twenty-eight of 33 existing EIS completed the survey. Between 2016 and 2020, the proportion of Quebec's population having access to EIS rose from 46% to 88%; >1,300 yearly admissions were reported by surveyed EIS, surpassing governments’ epidemiological estimates. Most programs set accessibility targets; adopted inclusive intake criteria and an open referral policy; engaged in education of referral sources. A wide range of biopsychosocial interventions and assertive outreach were offered by interdisciplinary teams. Administrative/organisational components were less widely implemented, such as clinical/administrative data collection, respecting recommended patient-to-case manager ratios and quality assurance.
Conclusion
Increased governmental implementation support including dedicated funding led to widespread implementation of good-quality, accessible EIS. Though some differences were found between programs founded before and after 2017, there was no overall discernible impact of year of implementation. Persisting challenges to collecting data may impede monitoring, data-informed decision-making, and quality improvement. Maintaining fidelity and meeting provincial standards may prove challenging as programs mature and adapt to their catchment area's specificities and as caseloads increase. Governmental incidence estimates may need recalculation considering recent epidemiological data.
Recent literature has revealed that financial inclusion enhances economic opportunities and security in developing countries. Moreover, a greater inflow of remittances can promote inclusiveness. In this paper, we explore the potential impacts of the COVID-19 outbreak on financial inclusion by focusing on its detrimental effect on remittance flows to developing countries. Using a household-level dataset collected in rural regions of the Philippines prior to the outbreak, we confirm that remittances are associated with financial inclusion, particularly for women. We discuss the potential impacts of the pandemic on financial inclusion through the change in the flow of remittances. We show that a substantial decline in remittances caused by the COVID-19 crisis may have an adverse effect on financial inclusion in the Philippines.
Background. Inequities in health care exist in the Philippines due to various modifiable and non-modifiable determinants. Through the years, different interventions were undertaken by the government and various stakeholders to address these inequities in primary care. However, inequities still continue to persist. The enactment of the Universal Health Care (UHC) Act aims to ensure that every Filipino will have equitable access to comprehensive and quality health care services by strengthening primary care. As a step towards UHC, the government endeavors to guarantee equity by prioritizing assistance and support to underserved areas in the country. This paper aims to review different interventions to promote equity in the underserved areas that could aid in needs assessment. Methods. A search through PUBMED and Google Scholar was conducted using the keywords, “inequity,” “primary care” and “Philippines.” The search yielded more than 10,000 articles which were further filtered to publication date, relevance to the topic, and credibility of source. A total of 58 full-text records were included in the review. Results and Discussion. In the Philippines, inequities in primary care exist in the context of health programs, facilities, human health resources, finances, and training. These were recognized by various stakeholders, from government and private sector, and nongovernment organizations, taking actions to address inequities, applying different strategies and approaches but with a shared goal of improving primary care. On another end, social accountability must also be instilled among Filipinos to address identified social and behavioral barriers in seeking primary care. With political commitment, improvement in primary care towards health equity can be achieved. Conclusion and Recommendation. To address inequities in primary care, there is a need to ensure adequate human resources for health, facilities, supplies such as medications, vaccination, clean water, and sources of funds. Moreover, regular conduct of training on healthcare services and delivery are needed. These will capacitate health workers and government leaders with continuous advancement in knowledge and skills, to be effective providers of primary care. Institutionalizing advocacy in equity through policies in healthcare provision would help realize the aims of the Universal Health Care Act.
This study explores the key factors that affected the deepening of financial inclusion across the 17 regions of the Philippines from 2013-2017. Using the regional multidimensional financial inclusion index (FII) developed by the BSP, the study finds out that significant heterogeneities exist among regions, and that they persist over time, suggesting most importantly that the least financially inclusive regions do not show significant progress. Moreover, using different panel estimation techniques, we try to determine the possible factors that affect this interregional financial inclusion heterogeneities. Overall, we show that regional GDP per capita, population, a proxy for the availability of physical infrastructure, and the degree of mobile penetration are among the robust factors explaining the financial inclusion variations across regions.
The objective of this paper is to analyse the changes that occurred in the regional disparities and sectoral specialisation of the Greek regions due to the economic crisis. The research problem is to identify the effect that the crisis had on the developmental perspectives of the regions and on regional policy priorities. In this framework, we explore the regional disparities, along with the allocation and specialisation of economic sectors in two separate time periods: the pre-crisis period (2000–2007) and the crisis period (2008–2014). The variable used is regional employment in the branches of economic activity. The methods used are Coefficient of Variation, Location Quotients and Shift-Share Analysis. According to the results, we classify the spatial units into categories and we propose means of regional policy. The results show that the disparities increased during the first period of the crisis and declined in the next, without, however, reaching the levels of 2000. In the first period the dynamic economic sectors are concentrated mainly in the metropolitan region of Attica and in the island region of South Aegean, while local advantages are shown in several regions except Attica. During the period of crisis, Attica and South Aegean lost their sectoral dynamism, while a few regions resisted. Regarding the local share effects, the more urbanised regions show negative local shares. The rest of the regions exhibit local advantages. Thus, according to these results, a concluding remark is that the more traditional activities seem to be more resilient, unlike the modern activities, which seem more sensitive to the crisis and are located mainly in the large cities and the most urbanised regions of the country. Regarding the proposed regional policy means, infrastructure improvement is indicated for most of the urbanised regions in order to improve their developmental environment. For the other regions, a more balanced sectoral structure must be promoted. Of course, in order to propose more targeted policy measures, it is important that regional development features (according to the classification of the regions and the proposed policy measures) be adapted to smaller areas and to a greater number of narrower economic sectors, rather than simply applying them at the regional level. This is also true of the effect that some other factors such as human capital and innovative capacity have on regional resilience. Future research will focus on this.
The purpose of this paper is to bridge the knowledge gap on how digital inclusion initiative can help people with disabilities (PWD's) into employment, and improve their capabilities.
We adopt a qualitative case study from the Philippines. Data is analysed through the lens of Amartya Sen's capability approach (CA). Interview and ethnographic data provide the evidence to analyse functionings for PWD and the barriers and facilitators of the functionings.
The findings indicate that online technology facilitated employment, which has wider implications than merely an improved financial situation. Challenges include lack of formal agreements and increased stress are negative consequences of the jobs they obtain.
More research is needed to see whether the findings can be replicated in other countries.
Government and private organizations can utilize the findings of this study as a guideline for helping PWD's to find employment, which can contribute to their capability building.
Structural changes taking place in national and regional economy may vary across nations and regions, causing socio-economic differentiation. This research is focused on analysis of the employment structure, its changes and influence on the level of social welfare, and its deepening of economic disparities between Latvian regions. We apply a comparative statistical analysis based on two tools: the Location Quotient and shift-share analysis, using official Latvian statistical data on employment and income with a breakdown by ten groups of economic activities for the period from 2008 to 2016. The obtained results indicate that the changes in the employment structure during the studied period had a noticeable impact on regional differentiation in Latvia. The authors have discovered that although employment concentration varies across Latvian regions, it remains remarkably stable over time, with occasional re-employment shifts occurring not always in the direction of industries providing higher income, which causes further regional socio-economic differentiation in Latvia.
In this paper, we assess empirically whether financial inclusion contributes to reducing income inequality when controlling for other key factors, such as economic development and fiscal policy. We conclude that financial inclusion contributes to reducing income inequality to a significant degree, while the size of the financial sector does not. Although our results are still preliminary and constrained by data limitations, they still bear significant policy implications. More specifically, fostering financial inclusion has one more important by-product, which had hardly been analyzed yet, namely reducing income inequality. More specifically, given the broad definition of financial inclusion used in our analysis, promoting financial inclusion implies facilitating the use of credit to low-income households, as well as granting credit to small and medium-sized enterprises.
URL: https://www.worldscientific.com/doi/abs/10.1142/S0217590818410047
Government interventions in the financial sector have prevailed in a number of countries until the early 1990s. Criticisms against financial repression and poor performance of public banks, however, turned the tide against government intervention. As a result, the 1990s saw the introduction of financial sector reforms in several developing countries with the objectives of improving allocative efficiency of the financial institutions and financial markets. However, the recent global financial crisis has led to a resurgent interest on the role that governments can play in the financial sector.
Several factors have contributed to the growth of the microfinance industry in the Philippines – the adoption of a sound business model – patterned after Grameen Bank – that caters to a large untapped market, assistance from government and / or donor agencies, a supportive policy and regulatory environment, and innovations based on Internet and mobile technology. However, microfinance institutions (MFIs) continue to face challenges that could affect their ability to reach more poor people even as they strive to achieve financial sustainability. To better understand the challenges faced by MFIs in meeting both their social and economic goals, we propose a research program that addresses the gaps in measuring the ‘quality’ and ‘welfare’ dimensions of financial inclusion, and that complements the development-economics literature by examining MFIs from a business-strategy perspective.
This paper examines the status and determinants of gender disparities in financial inclusion using a sample of 4,466 individuals from the Finscope survey in Tanzania. The results provide evidence to support gender disparities in financial inclusion, mostly pronounced in formal savings (21.3%), formal accounts (10.6%) and mobile money accounts (9.4%). This is reflected in 17.1% less likelihood of female ownership of a formal savings account but a 2% higher likelihood to access formal credit. Finally, the paper documents evidence that gender disparities in financial inclusion are explained by lower levels of education, income and over‐dependence of women on men. The findings support gender mainstreaming in other sectors to increase employment and education for women to close the gender gap in financial access.
The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic risks wiping out years of progress made in reducing global poverty. In this paper, we explore to what extent financial inclusion could help mitigate the increase in poverty using crosscountry data across 79 low-and lower-middle-income countries. Unlike other recent crosscountry studies, we show that financial inclusion, particularly financial outreach, is a key driver of poverty reduction in these countries. This effect is not direct, but indirect, by mitigating the detrimental effect that inequality has on poverty. Our findings are consistent across all the different measures of poverty used and robust to instrumental variables. Our forecasts suggest that by 2021 the world's population living on less than 1.90 per day. However, urgent improvements in financial inclusion could substantially reduce the impact on poverty.
The outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic came as a rare, unprecedented event and governments around the globe scrambled with emergency actions including social distancing measures, public awareness programs, testing and quarantining policies, and income support packages. In this paper, we examine the expected economic impact of government actions by analyzing the effect of such actions on stock market returns. Using daily data from January 22 to April 17, 2020 from 77 countries, we find announcements of government social distancing measures have a direct negative effect on stock market returns due to their adverse effect on economic activity, while an indirect positive effect through the reduction in COVID-19 confirmed cases. Government announcements regarding public awareness programs, testing and quarantining policies, and income support packages largely result in positive market returns. Our findings have important policy implications, primarily by showing that government social distancing measures have both positive and negative economic impact.
The Philippines' current development plan in pursuit of inclusive growth through strategies like infrastructure investment, improvement to governance, human development, employment creation, stable inflation and sustainable fiscal balance has resulted in early though limited successes. Challenges in the implementation include slow progress in public-private partnership programmes for infrastructure and inaccuracies in targeting the poor in the direct poverty relief programme. In fact, policy coherence and institutional strengthening are critical elements in pursuing inclusive growth.
Financial inclusion and financial development: implications for monetary policy effectiveness and economic Assessing the Efficacy of Government Intervention Mechanism on Financial Inclusion Initiatives in the Philippines and Their Implications on Economic Disparities growth in sub-Saharan Africa
- P O Takyi