Effect of Micro Finance Services on Poverty Alleviation in Pokhara

Abstract

The micro finance program stand for small loans to very poor people for their self-employment
activities which can help to generate income, improve their life style, increase their access to
social service. This study shows the effect of micro finance services to poverty alleviation. The
respondents are the clients of six different MFIs of Kaski district, Pokhara Metropolitan city
ward No. 21. The data were collected through well-designed and structured questionnaire.
The sample size is determined with the help of Yamine T. formula with the sample error of
seven percentages. The sample size is 180 out of 1526 of total population. The descriptive
as well as higher level of analysis such as; One-Way ANOVA, Correlation and Regression
analysis had been applied to get the more reliable result. The economic status shows that
micro saving program had brought the higher-level change of clients’ status. The level of
poverty had decreased after joining MFIs. Intuitional wise MFIs program such as; micro
saving, micro credit, micro insurance, micro training and poverty alleviation had depicted
perceptual difference towards MFIs. Similarly, age wise micro finance factor such as; micro
saving and poverty alleviation had perceptual difference towards MFIs. Marital status
wise micro-finance factor showed married women perceived different from before. Those
respondents who do not have formal education perceived different. The correlation shows that
all micro finance’s factor had negatively correlated to poverty reduction.