Around 7.2% of women in the country are using their own accounts in Mobile Financial Services (MFS) with 20% receiving services directly and indirectly from Self Financing Schemes (SFS), according to World Bank and GSMA 2022 data.
At the same time, women are not connected to 57.8% of SFS services, according to the Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies (BIDS) and Asian Development Bank (ADB) 2021 data.
The information was disclosed at a seminar titled "Gender Dimension of Digital Financial Services (DFS) in Bangladesh", organised by The Innovation and Development Associates (IDEA) Foundation at Bangabandhu Military Museum on Sunday.
Kazi M Aminul Islam, former alternate executive director of World Bank, former secretary and former chairman of Bangladesh Investment Development Authority (BIDA) and chairman of IDEA Foundation, presided over the seminar in the presence of the chief guest Md Hasanuzzaman Kallol, secretary of the Ministry of Women and Children Affairs and special guest Snigdha Ali, interim senior programme officer and gender advisor, Bangladesh and Women's Economic Empowerment Financial Services for the Poor, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
Md Hasanuzzaman Kallol said the Ministry of Women and Children Affairs undertook various projects in connection with the digital and mobile banking system to build equality between men and women.
"Some projects have already been launched through which women can export products out of the country," he added.
Snigdha Ali said, "Several government and private stakeholders are using information obtained from the research to help policymakers."
She further said that the main objective of this joint initiative is to bring all the women workers from across the garments and tea industries along with household workers under financial inclusion and move forward in building a digitized economy following the Smart Bangladesh vision.
"There are 9.5 million domestic workers in the country who also need to be brought into the mainstream audience through financial inclusion," the country lead added.
The Innovation and Development Associates (IDEA) Foundation is an association of socio-economic development associates in Bangladesh engaged in independent research, policy analysis, advocacy, consultancy and project implementation.