The determinants of financial inclusion in Africa
Open accessAbstract
The objective of this paper is to examine the determinants of financial inclusion in Africa. We use the World Bank's Global Findex database on 37 African countries to perform probit estimations. We find that being a man, richer, more educated and older favor financial inclusion with a higher influence of education and income. Mobile banking is driven by the same determinants than traditional banking. We observe that the determinants of informal finance differ from those of formal finance. Our work therefore contains findings to design policies to foster financial inclusion in African countries.
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A large number of developing economies have prepared a financial inclusion strategy that helps to expand the sources of funding, limits informal financial services, and promotes investment and thereby economic growth.
“As a result, a large number of developing economies have prepared a financial inclusion strategy that helps to expand the sources of funding, limits informal financial services, and promotes investment and thereby economic growth (Zins and Weill 2016; Demirgüç-Kunt et al. 2018).”
From Financial Inclusion and Economic Growth in Sub-Saharan Africa—A Panel ARDL and Granger Non-Causality Approach (2023) · cites this paper as Zins and Weill 2016
The Introduction (article pp. 46–57) says financial inclusion enables formal saving and borrowing and can help people invest, finance projects, and support economic development. It does not say that a large number of developing economies have prepared financial-inclusion strategies. Moreover, §2.3 reports that formal inclusion does not necessarily reduce informal finance and may be positively related to its use. (LLM, conf=0.87)
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Financial inclusion and fintech: a state-of-the-art systematic literature review
Ha, D., Le, P., & Nguyen, D. K. (2025) · Financial Innovation · doi:10.1186/s40854-024-00741-0 · Cited by 110 · see citing works
“…key areas: creating metrics for financial inclusion (Sarma 2016; Mialou et al. 2017), exploring the factors that influence financial inclusion (Zins and Weill 2016; Kumar 2013; Kaba-kova and Plaksenkov 2018), and examining the impact of financial inclusion (Hannig and Jansen 2010; Adegbite…”
Siddiki, J., & Bala-Keffi, L. R. (2024) · Economic Modelling · doi:10.1016/j.econmod.2024.106707 · Cited by 41 · see citing works
Jima, M. D., & Makoni, P. L. (2023) · Journal of Risk and Financial Management · doi:10.3390/jrfm16060299 · Cited by 39 · see citing works
- Authors
- Zins, A., & Weill, L.
- Affiliations
- Université de Strasbourg (FR)
- EM Strasbourg Business School (FR)
- Corresponding author
- Weill, Laurent
- Venue
- Review of Development Finance
- Publisher
- Elsevier BV
- Published
- 2016-06
- Volume
- 6
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 46-57
- ISSN
- 1879-9337 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2488680642
- Cited by
- 738
- References
- 16
- Citations by year
- 2026: 74 · 2025: 113 · 2024: 100 · 2023: 118 · 2022: 98 · 2021: 75 · 2020: 86 · 2019: 39 · 2018: 26 · 2017: 9
- FWCI
- 47.92
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Review of Development Finance (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Economics, Econometrics and Finance › Economics and Econometrics › Microfinance and Financial Inclusion
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Information Systems › Economic Growth and Development
- Social Sciences › Business, Management and Accounting › Management Information Systems › FinTech, Crowdfunding, Digital Finance
- Keywords
- financial inclusion, determinants of financial inclusion, Africa, mobile banking, informal finance, formal financial services, income, gender, age, financial inclusion policy
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