A recent report dubbed Rwanda Youth Financial Inclusion Report produced by Access to Finance Rwanda (AFR) in partnership with National Bank of Rwanda, Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning and National Institute and of Statistics Rwanda showed that only 31 per cent are banked. The report’s findings showed that the youth are less included than the rest of the population. This was evident from an overall financial inclusion of only 88% for the youth compared to 95% for the rest of the population with young women more likely to be included than young males. The report concluded that 31 percent or 650,751 Rwandan youth are banked up from 24 percent ( 559,862) in 2016 are using products or services from licensed commercial banks regulated by the central bank. Employed youth as well as those living in urban centres are more likely to be banked than those living in rural areas. Credit penetration was also found to be very low, and it is particularly low among the youth with only 57 per cent of the youth having access to credit and only 4 per cent of them from banks. With only 4 per of the youth having access to bank credit, bank credit penetration is very low. Education, employment, income generation is one of the main drivers of financial inclusion according to the analysis. The above statistics paint an unattractive picture of the low formal financial inclusion among the youth which has seen them often miss out on lending as well as access to capital. This is concerning as youth make up the largest segment of the economy. Going forward, sector stakeholders, banks included, ought to huddle up and look at their input in financial inclusion. The recommendations from the report would probably be a starting point; leveraging technology to provide financial services and introduce new products.
