Financial Sector Assessment A Handbook, Chapter 7 Rural and Microfinance Institutions: Regulatory and Supervisory Issues, IMF and World Bank, August 2005

The providing of financial services to the poor and the very-poor, particularly in rural areas, is the purpose of microfinance institutions (MFIs), and the assessment of the regulatory framework for MFIs is part of broader assessment of adequacy of access. Access, however, is multidimensional, and assessing its adequacy requires a review of (a) the range of financial services provided—and target groups served—by several tiers of formal, semiformal, and informal financial institutions; (b) the demand for financial services from households, microenterprises, and small businesses at different levels of the income strata; and (c) the different combinations of financial service providers, the users of those services, and the range of services that prevail in different geographical segments of the market. The primary objectives of the assessment of the adequacy of access are (a) to identify the gaps that exist (and that need to be corrected) in the range of products that are available for different layers of households, microenterprises, and small businesses in various geographic markets; and (b) to assess whether the regulatory framework for financial transactions helps expand or restrict access to the needed financial services.