Promoting Micro-Savings through the NGO Model: The Success Story of Sinapi Aba Trust

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to offer a cogent basis for integration of voluntary micro-savings into the NGO model of microfinance. We use data from SINAPI ABA TRUST (SAT), a microfinance institution operating in Ghana. The study finds that voluntary savings scheme of SAT has outperformed its compulsory counterpart in terms of annual growth in savings mobilization and that despite the predominance of females in the microfinance industry their propensity to save is less than their male counterparts. The paper concludes that, contrary to the orientation of the NGO model of microfinance, the poor and financially excluded are willing to save.