FINANCIAL INCLUSION IN RWANDA: AN OVERVIEW

Abstract

Financial inclusion is a major policy concern with governments across the world. Rwanda as a country with fast development averaging to 6.9% from 2011 to 2015 has done an improvement in financial inclusion as well. This country with stable growth interested the researchers to know whether this development goes hand in hand with financial inclusion. This paper is an attempt to show the overview of financial inclusion in Rwanda. Secondary data from Rwanda Fin scope survey 2008, 2012 and 2016 were used in this study. Apart from that, this paper uses data from Banque National du Rwanda from 2011 to 2015. Many researches were conducted on financial inclusion in different countries but none of them took Rwanda as a special case. The results show that there is an improvement in financial inclusion in Rwanda as the number of financially excluded dropped from 52% in 2008 to 11% in 2016.The problem is that the number of banked adults did not increase from 2008 to 2016. Banked adults in Rwanda were 14% in 2008, 23% in 2012 and 26% in 2016.This shows that many Rwandan adults are not banked. The government should continue to mobilize citizens to join banks. Mobile payment improved tremendously and this should be strengthened and more regulated as it is serving many Rwandans.