few commercial banks are in fact equipped to deal efficiently with very small firms given their high mortality rates low availability of collaterals and demand for microloans data from the mix market database show that the percentage of female borrowers from ngos and nbfis is much higher than from commercial banks providing microloans especially in east asia and the pacific where women account for of the microborrowers from ngos and only of the borrowers from commercial and rural banks therefore even if the private sector has proven to be an innovative and fast growing provider of microloans subsidised credit and other public interventions still play an important role in increasing access to credit for women of all socioeconomic backgrounds thereby contributing to financial inclusion and the fight against poverty through entrepreneurship karlan and morduch technological innovations like mobile banking are promising tools for extending financial services to selfemployed women particularly in rural areas