The Effect Of Microfinance Services On Economic Empowerment Of Small Scale Farmers In Kiambu County

Abstract

Microfinance services have continued to play an important role in Kenyan economy. Many studies have explored effect of microfinance on economic growth, but none of them have focused on effect of microfinance services on economic empowerment of small scale farmers in Kiambu County. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to determine effect of microfinance service on economic empowerment of small scale farmers in Kiambu County. A quantitative descriptive design was employed to study 100 framers in Kiambu County. A sample of 100 respondents from a list of 304,449 was taken as a representative population in the county. The study focused on dependent and independent relationship, and a multiple regression analysis was conducted to determine the relationship of three variables, which is access to credit, provision of financial literacy and access to market with respect to economic empowerment. The regression analysis established that the three independent variables have a positive correlation with the dependent variable. Access to credit, provision of financial literacy and access to market contribute positively to economic empowerment. The ANOVA analysis was meant to determine whether the variation in the independent variables explains the observed variance in the outcome, which is economic empowerment as used in the study. ANOVA findings in this study revealed that there was correlation between the predictor variables (Access to Credit, Provision of financial literacy and Access to market) and response variable (Economic empowerment) since P- value of 0.000 was less than 0.05, indicating a positive relationship between study variables.