MANILA, Philippines—The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) wants to gain more insights into small businesses run by Filipino women and has commissioned a survey to identify policy needs that would help promote gender equality and financial inclusion in the local economy.
In a statement, the BSP said is has partnered with the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and global financial giant JP Morgan Chase to launch a gender-focused micro, small and medium-sized enterprise demand-side survey in the country.
The Frankfurt School and Kadence — an international market research company specializing in consulting, data collection and field services — has been engaged to design and do the survey.
The survey is a part of the BSP’s efforts to boost lending to smaller firms through and beyond the pandemic.
“Filipino women entrepreneurs dominate the country’s MSME landscape,” BSP Governor Benjamin Diokno said. “When we support women’s access to finance, we enable the MSME sector to achieve its full potential as driver of inclusive economic growth in the country.”
“The MSME demand-side survey is, thus, an important initiative toward building a deeper understanding of the sector to support evidence-based policymaking and provide valuable market insights for financial service providers to strategically serve [smaller firms],” he said.
Although women represent a vibrant part of the MSME sector, limited data and evidence restrict more targeted policies to support their unique business development needs and requirement.
The survey will pioneer national level reporting on the bottlenecks, challenges as well as opportunities for women’s businesses from a demand-side perspective. It will also look at the key characteristics of the MSMEs; access and use of financial products, including digital financial products; and the impact of COVID-19 on businesses.
“This survey represents an important step towards informing the path forward to not only increase access to financial services but also to ensure they are best meeting the needs of MSMEs and women across sectors and regions of the Philippines,” ADB senior finance specialist Kelly Hattel said.
The results of the survey are expected to be ready by the fourth quarter of 2021.