“Banking on Girls: From Piggy Banks to Savings Accounts” - Should girls be considered a separate segment when designing youth savings programs?

Is it more difficult to financially include girls? Data from some programs seeking to increase girls’ participation in formal savings seems to suggest it might be.¹

Why might girls be more difficult to reach? Do programs targeting girls need to integrate different approaches? Should savings programs provide a safe place not just for girls’ savings, but also to gather with other girls to speak openly about specific challenges and concerns related to financial inclusion that they may have?

This was the topic of discussion during a recent SEEP network webinar as part of the Understanding Youth and their Financial Needs webinar series. Savings specialist Ryan Newton, Women’s World Banking, spoke about the organization’s program, running since 2009 that works to develop the financial capability of girls and young women.

Newton discussed the programs’ methods for approaching savings and financial education specifically for girls, and how the program has impacted adolescent girls over time. Women’s World Banking’s approaches have included marketing and outreach that appeal to girls (for example, marketing images of young women in careers that girls from the market research desired) focusing financial education on key knowledge gaps, misperceptions, and barriers that girls in particular are subject to when saving. Newton also spoke about the importance of having younger field staff that can be mentors and can relate to youth at a community level. After several years of project implementation and cross-cultural research, Women’s World Banking found that groups that benefited from financial education and savings had more confidence in their future, better savings habits and made better decisions when it came to their health and education. Having access to savings accounts and savings groups can help girls stay safe and allow them to save money, setting the framework for economic stability throughout their lives.

The significance of social support can be seen not only in Women’s World Banking programs as Newton discussed, but also programs implemented by Population Council. According to Population Council’s report on creating smart savings products for Kenyan and Ugandan vulnerable adolescent girls, girls “valued the social support component (i.e.. making friends and having a mentor) as much as, if not more than, the financial services they were receiving.”1 Without support from family members, particularly mothers and friends, the Population Council found that girls were less likely to practice good savings habits even after participating in financial education classes.1 The Population Council report also found that without community support young girls and women who participated in savings programs could be subject to intensified abuse from the opposite sex, particularly older men who had in the past provided them with monetary support.1 Social support programs tailored to break barriers and fill knowledge gaps in girls and female adolescent populations and marketing designed specifically for girls seem to provide favorable environment for girls to more securely and successfully participate in and reap the benefits of financial capability and inclusion programs; this, in turn, could improve their chances at achieving a more economically secure future. To watch the “Banking on Girls: From Piggy Banks to Savings Accounts” webinar, click here.

¹Austrian, K. and E. Muthengi. 2013. “Safe and Smart Savings Products for Vulnerable Adolescent Girls in Kenya and Uganda: Evaluation Report.” Nairobi: Population Council.