'Low financial literacy, informal borrowing' Fempreneurs face age-old challenges. How fintechs are lending help?

livemint.com:

women entrepreneurs or fempreneurs still face age-old challenges like unawareness about government financial schemes, dependency on family credits, informal borrowing, lack of digital literacy, and others during their journey to become job-creators. About 52% women entrepreneurs have access to financial credit, but 47% females are struggling with various challenges, according to latest data shared by fintech company Tide as quoted by Economic Times.

It also revealed that around 95% of women are not familiar with the existing government initiatives to leverage their business that shifted them towards informal sector for credits. Besides these factors, women also have less decision-making power, low risk aversion, and fewer financial facilities as compared to men, said Appalla Saikiran, founder and CEO of SCOPE.

“These difficulties can be made worse if women are living under specific cultural ideas which discourage entrepreneurship or self-reliance, financially narrowing down more on their possibilities of acquiring credits," he told LiveMint. Kunal Varma, Freo CEO and cofounder suggested that better financial literacy among women, more gender-sensitive banking practices, and representing females as decision-makers and business correspondents can enhance accessibility of financial credit to women.

“Women must know how to negotiate the financial system and the benefits of formal credit. Delivering training on financial management, business planning, ethical borrowing, encouraging them to join microfinance organisations and self-help groups can be beneficial," Saikiran asserted.