Title: The effect of financial inclusion on poverty alleviation and economic growth: a view from an emerging market

Authors: Zakaria Boulanouar; Osama Badr; Khaled Sayed Ahmed

Addresses: Department of Accounting and Finance, College of Business and Economics, The United Arab Emirates University Al Ain, Abu Dhabi, UAE ' Faculty of Commerce, Department of Economics, University of Tanta, Tanta, Egypt ' Faculty of Commerce, Department of Economics, University of Tanta, Tanta, Egypt

Abstract: This study investigates the impact of financial inclusion (FI) on Egypt's economic growth and poverty reduction. A summary of the extensive FI literature review is conducted, including Egypt's experience. Using 21 years' worth of data from the WDI database, the relationship between FI, economic growth, and poverty reduction was estimated using the least squares (LS) and autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) regression models. Our results show that greater FI and government spending growth lead to more economic growth. However, an increase in trade openness reduces the rate of economic growth, indicating that trade openness happens in the direction of consumer imports. Moreover, improving FI leads to a higher poverty rate, and a greater concentration of income reduces the poverty rate.

Keywords: financial inclusion; poverty alleviation; economic growth; emerging market; poverty reduction; Egypt; emerging market; trade openness; government spending; income concentration.

DOI: 10.1504/IJAAPE.2024.135565

International Journal of Accounting, Auditing and Performance Evaluation, 2024 Vol.20 No.1/2, pp.183 - 205

Received: 30 Mar 2022
Received in revised form: 04 Dec 2022
Accepted: 30 Jan 2023
Published online: 18 Dec 2023 *

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