The effect of access to credit on financial performance of women small enterprises :

Abstract

Women in the world account the highest economic growth through the economic activities they engage in. Even though women entrepreneurs in Pallisa district have been known to engage in small scale retail enterprises, there has been a need to grow their businesses beyond the current level. However, hindering factors such as lower academic standards, higher interest rates, low income from these businesses and socio-cultural constraints have contributed to poor growth and management of these businesses. Access to credit by these women has also been hampered by these factors. The study investigated the challenges of access to credit on the growth of women owned enterprises in Pallisa district. The study was guided by the overall objective of identifying reasons why women owning small enterprises do not access credit. The study reviewed related literature and identified a gap in the literature. Use of questionnaires and interview schedules to collect primary data was preferred in this study. The study adopted a descriptive survey research design. It targeted women entrepreneurs in Pallisa district and the management of various micro- finance institutions in the region. The desired sample size was identified using t Sample Sizes where the sample size comprised of 42 respondents. SPSS was used to code and enter data for analysis. The study adopted both the qualitative and quantitative analysis in order to achieve the objective of the study where the former used descriptive statistics where graphs, tables and pie charts have been used. This research used quantitative analysis to analyze collected data. The study established that education levels affects access to credit by women entrepreneurs, income levels affect access to credit by women entrepreneurs, interest rate affects access to credit by women entrepreneurs, socio cultural aspects affect access to credit by women entrepreneurs.