Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/201401 
Authors: 
Year of Publication: 
2009
Series/Report no.: 
DIW Discussion Papers No. 715
Version Description: 
Revised Version, 4 February 2009
Publisher: 
Deutsches Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung (DIW), Berlin
Abstract: 
This paper explores the use of informal credit as a strategy for managing risks by market women in northern Ghana. A broad concept of the costs of risk management strategies is introduced and encompasses both a time and monetary dimension. Based on qualitative data, the analysis reveals that market women invest a considerable amount of time in maintaining complex networks of informal credit providers to insure their access to credit once a shock occurs. Informal credit involves high transaction costs and prevents market women from growing out of poverty in the long term.
Subjects: 
Africa
Ghana
informal credit
risk management
women
JEL: 
O12
O17
D13
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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