{"id":10893,"date":"2025-06-19T00:05:29","date_gmt":"2025-06-19T00:05:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=10893"},"modified":"2025-06-19T00:05:29","modified_gmt":"2025-06-19T00:05:29","slug":"financial-inclusion-surges-gaps-persist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=10893","title":{"rendered":"Financial inclusion surges, gaps persist"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>Financial inclusion in Pakistan has quadrupled in a decade, rising from just 8% in 2013 to 35% in 2024, according to the latest Karandaaz Financial Inclusion Survey (K-FIS). This growth is largely attributed to mobile money usage, which now reaches 30% of adults, up from under 1% ten years ago.<\/p>\n<p>Karandaaz Pakistan released the 2024 K-FIS, marking ten years of demand-side financial data and offering insights for advancing inclusive finance in the country.<\/p>\n<p>Despite notable gains, gaps in access, trust, and equity remain. Only 14% of women report owning a full-service financial account, compared to 56% of men. Mobile phone ownership among women stands at 46%, significantly lower than 82% for men, limiting access to digital financial services.<\/p>\n<p>Geographic disparities also persist. Punjab leads with 40% financial inclusion, followed by Islamabad (38%) and Gilgit-Baltistan (33%). Balochistan (23%) and Azad Jammu &amp; Kashmir (25%) trail behind.<\/p>\n<p>Adoption of the government-backed RAAST payment system has risen sharply. Wallet registrations have more than doubled from 17% to 41% in two years. Users cited speed (77%) and affordability (43%) as key benefits.<\/p>\n<p>Waqasul Hasan, CEO of Karandaaz, said, &#8220;As the K-FIS results reveal, there is a persistent and troubling gender divide. Today, 56% of adult men in Pakistan have a registered financial account, compared to just 14% of women.&#8221; He added, &#8220;Karandaaz envisions a Pakistan where these divides no longer exist and where every individual, regardless of gender, has the tools to participate fully in the formal economy. Inclusion is not a one-time achievement, but is a continuous journey, and data must guide us.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Despite this progress, formal financial services remain underutilised. A striking 85% of adults continue to rely on informal sources \u2014 mainly family and friends \u2014 for credit. Meanwhile, trust remains a critical barrier: only 9% of excluded adults say they trust banks and just 8% trust mobile money providers.<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Financial inclusion in Pakistan has quadrupled in a decade, rising from just 8% in 2013 to 35% in 2024, according to the latest Karandaaz Financial Inclusion Survey (K-FIS). This growth is largely attributed to mobile money usage, which now reaches 30% of adults, up from under 1% ten years ago. Karandaaz Pakistan released the 2024 [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10893","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-english-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10893","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10893"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10893\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10893"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10893"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10893"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}