Rwandans who have access to any form of financial products or services grew by 3 percentage points to 96 per cent, or 7.9 million between 2020 and 2024, a new report unveiled by Access to Finance Rwanda (AFR) has indicated.

However, those with access to formal financial products and services such as those offered by banks, microfinance, insurance, and mobile money institutions grew by 15 percentage points to 92 per cent in the same period.

"The 15 percentage points increase [reported] is not something you would see in many countries,” Soraya Hakuziyaremye, Deputy Governor at the National Bank of Rwanda, said, adding that this was achieved mainly due to several efforts put in place by the government such as deliberate decision to design gender responsive financial inclusion policies.

Out of the financially included, only 22 per cent have bank accounts. This means that one in three adults or 2.5 million, representing 31 per cent of the total population in Rwanda, are using banking channels or services, the report found.

The rest, 70 per cent, have access to other formal financial services, up from 55 per cent in 2020, driven mainly by mobile money, insurance and pension.

Out of those formally served, 91 per cent use mobile money, 30 per cent use Saving and Credit Cooperative Society (SACCO), 25 per cent pension, 23 per cent insurance, and 6 per cent prefer microfinance institutions (MFIs).

The number of Rwandans who have access to formal financial services increased except those who have access to SACCOs and MFIs.

Rwandans with access to mobile money services increased by 19 percentage points, while those with access to insurance and pension products grew by 10 percentage points and 17 percentage points, respectively.

The number of Rwandans who have access to SACCO and MFI services dropped significantly by 21 percentage points to 5 percentage points, respectively.

Access to informal financial services slightly decreased from 78 per cent to 72 per cent in the year under review. This implies that 5.6 million people use services which are not regulated and operate without legal governance that would be recognised such as money lenders.

"We would like to see further decrease because the decrease in informal access will signal that people are now moving to access formal financial services,” John Rwirahira, Head of Research and Information at Access to Finance Rwanda, said.

Financial exclusion – those with no access to any form of financial services or products – decreased from 7 per cent to 4 per cent, or 316,000 people.

The target, Hakuziyaremye noted, is to have zero per cent financial exclusion.