OBJECTIVE To quantify the impact of cash transfer and microfinance interventions on a selected list of tuberculosis (TB) risk factors and assess their potential role in supporting TB control. DATA SOURCE Published and unpublished references identified from clinical and social electronic databases, grey literature and web sites. METHODS Eligible interventions had to be conducted in middle- o...

BACKGROUND Despite Uganda's progress in promoting affirmative action for persons with disabilities and its strategy of using microfinance to fight poverty, access to microfinance services by persons with disabilities is still problematic due to barriers, characterised by discrepancies between policies and practices. Regarding education, the affirmative action in favour of learners with disabili...

Microfinance loans have expanded greatly in the recent years as a way of helping the poor gain cheaper loans, but percentage take-up of microcredit has remained lower than expectations. In an attempt to explain this phenomenon, this paper uses a randomized evaluation of the impact of introducing microfinance loans in a new urban setting in Hyderabad, India, to determine if lack of flexibility i...

Microfinance programs and institutions are increasingly important in development strategies but knowledge about their impacts is partial and contested. This paper reviews the methodological options for the impact assessment (IA) of microfinance. Following a discussion of the varying objectives of IA it examines the choice of conceptual frameworks and presents three paradigms of impact assessmen...

In this paper we analyse the effects of microfinance programs upon household welfare in Vietnam. Our analytical framework builds upon the rural household models of Singh et al. (1986) and Rosenzweig (1990). Data on 470 households across 25 villages was collected using a quasiexperiment survey approach to overcome self-selection bias. In our econometric analysis the welfare effects of microfinan...

This note reviews the microfinance sector in Ghana within the context of its potential for growth and development. The paper argues that microfinance, when properly harnessed can make significant contributions through several channels. Microfinance can promote higher investment leading to economic empowerment, which in turn promotes confidence and self-esteem, particularly for the vulnerable. I...

Microfinance plays an important role in the improvement of the livelihood of people especially in developing countries. The provision of microfinance services (such as micro loans, insurance, savings and technical assistance, among others) are considered as good measures for the reduction of poverty and levels of unemployment. The expansion of microfinance services has been accompanied with unp...

We provide a quantitative evaluation of the aggregate and distributional impact of microfinance or credit programs targeted toward small businesses. We find that the redistributive impact of microfinance is stronger in general equilibrium than in partial equilibrium, but the impact on aggregate output and capital is smaller in general equilibrium. Aggregate total factor productivity (TFP) incre...

Improved sanitation access is extremely low in rural Cambodia. Non-governmental organizations have helped build local supply side latrine markets to promote household latrine purchase and use, but households cite inability to pay as a key barrier to purchase. To examine the extent to which microfinance can be used to facilitate household investment in sanitation, we applied a twopronged assessm...

Microfinance is the provision of financial services for the poor. Health program through microfinance has the potential to address several access barriers to health. We report the design and baseline findings of a multi-site non-randomized evaluation of the effect of a health program on the members of two microfinance organizations from Karnataka and Gujarat states of India. Villages identified...