Do Women Require Specialized Digital Financial Instruments to Meet Their Needs? Insights from Ghana

Despite the growth of digital financial services (DFS) in Ghana, researchers have identified its uneven availability and usage; particularly among women. Against this background, experts have recommended the need for innovative digital financial solutions that have the capacity to address the uneven distribution and utilization of digital financial services. However, the key policy questions are: what service innovations will women require to improve their adoption rate? Second, what service attributes hinder a more active and rational use of digital financial services among women? The study concentrated on the mobile money financial market and applied the discrete choice experiment method to examine the factors that define preferences and willingness to pay for service innovations among women in Ghana. The study focused on service innovations in four product portfolios; i.e. wealth management services, digital insurance, digital payments, and digital savings. A total of 1300 respondents were sampled across 8 randomly selected districts in Ghana. The mixed logit estimation results suggest that women require specialized financial instruments and have a strong preference for innovations in digital savings and insurance product portfolios to meet their needs. The findings also suggested that product attributes that reflect an integration of traditional financial practices in the digital financial space will drive up the adoption rate among women in Ghana. Consequently, the study advises that successful service innovations or product advancements should strike a harmonious balance between conventional and digital financial practices to achieve substantial success.