Attitude of rural women towards savings and money management

The womenfolk in all sections of our society are normally seen to have a general propensity to save something for the future and in many cases they are found to be the main family members who more or less always remain highly worried and feel a spontaneous inner urge to care about asset and money management of the family so that they can at least make both ends meet to live well. They are sometimes compelled to be over-anxious and take action whatever it be the shy for saving something because of dire economic need and sheer social insecurity and helplessness.  Economic insecurity is often caused in the event of sudden and untimely death of the main family earner or often by the brute exercise of unwelcome divorce and often based on the prevailing and anticipated miserable maintenance condition of minor children. Under gloomy and disastrous circumstances women are by nature found to be cautious, careful, and very much worried about their worldly life and living. So thriftiness comes first of all for active consideration of backward rural womenfolk. There is a Bangla adage, "Womenfolk's coffer is never empty; if you are in want of money, all you have to do is to ask for it."
In our society also a female child is usually taught about the importance and practices of "thrift" as one of the virtues to be cultivated and maintained throughout whole life, so that after entering the wedlock she can be an asset and very much praiseworthy to the family of her husband. "Thrift" is therefore regarded as one of the first and foremost qualities and standards on which a young bride is judged at first sight for acceptance. She should not be lavish and expected not to spend a single penny just for pleasure. At this she naturally becomes careful and takes measures and initiatives to save something this way and that way and becomes thrifty for their welfare. As her children grow older she naturally tries to establish and attain her authority and control over most of the family affairs. By the middle age, she is seen to be radically dominant in the affairs of the family decision making including sharing important decisions of the household including earning, spending, investment and other related matters.
Women's earning classified: The women's earning in rural Bangladesh can be broadly classified into four categories:
l Income in case of those who are major family earners,
l Supplementary income generated by women's activities around the family
l Deductions from the family spending and budget, and
l Money received by way of remittance from an earning son/ward for the woman
Reason behind savings by rural women: A woman has little scope at the beginning of her married life to share or get involved in any formal or informal economic activities, particularly in   savings and expenditures of the family. She is treated by her in-laws at this stage as an alien intruder and as such she is not given any scope to    participate in any affairs of the family. As soon as she becomes a mother, particularly mother of a male child, her position develops and turns strong gradually. She starts exerting her influence in all affairs of the family. She then enjoys the opportunity to handle monetary power to some extent for family expenses and investments, though she often finds a male for executing for important deals and buying. However she gradually regains her status and starts saving for emergency subsistence for herself and her children. She attempts to save something against the possibility of divorce and fear of untimely death of her husband. Rural women always remain in the state of insecurity fearing divorces or second marriages by their husbands and they know that the fund, promised by their husbands at the time of their wedlock to be used for their support in case of divorce or other crisis, is virtually never given. She is therefore compelled to think in terms of saving money for her existence and survival in bad days as well as to meet future unforeseen demand of life and cost of living.
Savings by the mid-level and poor women: Women from landless labourer households feel the urge to save mainly to meet the family's need during crisis periods. They know very well that income is seasonal and uncertain and that a crisis will come and there is nobody to help them during thesis. When a financial crisis approaches, such women take loans from the neighbours and the latter want it to be repaid soon. Some poor women save in the hope of buying sari or children's clothes. Most of the mid-level farm families have cows, goats and a few poultry birds. While the men take care of the draft oxen and male cows, the women usually take care of the milch cows, goats and the poultry birds. Income generated from the sale of milk and from female calves is used partly to meet family expenses and are partly saved by the women. It becomes easy on the part of the women to manage the sale of milk by themselves, as milkmen come to the house to buy it everyday.
Rural women also save "Mushti" rice. For each meal they take out a handful [Mushti] of rice to save. Three handfuls a day accumulate at least to meet some emergencies. Women in the rural areas who process agriculture produce after harvest have an opportunity to withhold some surplus unknown to their spouses. This may be marketed secretly or sold to their neighbours for a lower price or bartered for sari or betel leaves. The woman heading the household may save grocery and other farm products, such as garlic, oil, seeds or other food grains. After collecting and accumulating them for some months she may send them to market. Most rural households raise poultry. The income usually belongs to the woman and the household. Sale of vegetables and fruits is another common source of women's income.   Besides cottage industry is another source of income for women living in the rural areas.
Why women hide savings: Women usually hide personal savings, especially from the husband or grown-up sons living at home. If the husband knows about her hidden savings, he is likely to demand a loan which is seldom repaid. It is difficult for women to let their money work for them without exposing it to their husbands unless they can buy an animal or make a similar investment in some enterprises. However most of them keep it hidden or with their parents, who buy a plot of land in the name of their daughter, and then the husband is informed that the parents or her brother has bought the land as a gift for her or someone in the women's parents' house or may take the money and buy some gold with it and the woman's husband is informed that they have given her a gold necklace as a gift. This common scenario applies more or less to all women in the rural society of Bangladesh.
Banking scope for women: As for using banks for small savings many rural women feel they are not welcome. Being usually illiterate, banking procedures are bewildering to them. Most of them are quite willing to keep their money in the banking system provided they can physically visit the bank and they are assured of confidentiality of the account they hold with the bank. The main constraints to women preventing them from the benefits of banking are as follows:
Lack of motivation: For most rural women, banks for savings are seldom a conscious option. They don't come in contact with them; banking is not a topic of their discussion with another woman nor does banks' publicity programmes reach them.
Social restriction: Respectable women from farmer families might have money to save but they usually confine their movements to the neighbourhood, while poor women or old widows who don't have money are free any way to go farther as they have to work. If a respectable woman goes out for any reason, a male relative usually escorts her. But because of her need to maintain privacy she can hardly do any banking on those occasions. However women whose children are grown up can sometimes take initiatives to go out and work around. College-educated women in rural Bangladesh now-a-days go out for shopping and some are also employed in different projects in rural areas. They are regarded by rural farm women as having a different value system. Women with modern outlook may however visit banking premises. The main practical problem is that the women from respectable farm families who have the money are the ones least likely to feel able to go to a bank.
Fear of husband: Even if a rural woman has the courage to visit a bank and deal with the documents, she still might be constrained by fear that her husband might come to know about her savings and their marriage or relation might be in jeopardy.
Absence of women's banking facilities: Despite policies of different financial institutions to hire female bankers, rural branches of banks do not have sufficient female employees who can really be of great help to the poor rural women particularly in their banking need. The few rural bank branches, which maintain a very small number of female employees, further lack necessary operational arrangements for covering and attracting this sort of poor rural women by offering easy banking services, free of procedural complexities, although it is essential to make agro-based rural economy more vibrant with the participation of womenfolk whose contribution for boosting agricultural sector is enormous and never to be denied.
Complex bank procedure: Most rural women are not only illiterate but also lack numeracy skills. As a result, they have got no idea about bank records, interest computation, time deposits and the like. It is therefore necessary to think seriously right now about how these interested rural women can be brought under the extensive coverage of the easy banking facilities.  
Issues to mobilise women's savings: In view of the above, if the rural banking system wants to mobilise women's savings and their participation, necessary stress should be given inter alia on the following aspects:
House-to-house campaigning: Since the outside movement of women in the rural society is often restricted by various norms, the only way to reach these potential savers is through organised motivational approach through house-to-house campaign by bankers' community.
Separate enclosure for women: A separate enclosure in all rural bank branches may be set up for the convenience of women where they would be able to meet their banking needs comfortably.
Women bankers: Banks should employ local women as campaigners to mobilise women's savings because a woman normally feels free and easy in the presence of women bank officers to perform her business with self-confidence.
Local women bank agents: Local women with some education may be employed as part-time banking agents to mobilise women's savings in the rural areas. Such women agents might be selected from among the wives of school teachers, other salaried persons or from locally welfare-minded respectable families. Meantime, the RMG sector has assumed exemplary development in the country, where unskilled young girls from poor and extreme poor households in rural areas are enabling them to graduate from the vicious circle of poverty and extreme poverty. These positive impacts by way of earning the wages on the part of the rural women workforce are to contribute substantively to the formation of ambitious rural savings to a great extent. Foreign remittance inflows in the rural areas, beneficiaries of which are mostly from womenfolk further can play a vital role in formation of women's savings in the rural banking system. Almost half of the labour force, about 50 per cent of which comprise female workers, are generally employed in the agricultural sector of rural Bangladesh. This agricultural labour force being composed of distressed women, poverty is high among them. This adverse situation can be overcome by creating massive gainful employment among them and thereby creating ample opportunities of more and more savings among the rural womenfolk who really need savings for bare survival in life.
Women tend to save which is one of their natural characteristics. But the amount of savings by the poor women living in the rural areas is small and rarely it encompasses the formal banking sector. Total effectiveness of mobilising rural women's savings may be carefully examined through proper field study and research. However, rural women's savings, though inadequate in volume, when combined together can create a palpable impact on microeconomic stability. Robust growth of such savings will help boost the rural economy of Bangladesh.

K M Ahasanul Huque is a freelance writer, professionally engaged in telecom services and interested in tourism and social welfare. Email: [email protected]