Publications

Key findings of the research: confirmed that Ethiopian MFIs are highly dependent on fund from external sources and they will find it difficult to extend loan for biogas user while satisfying the current financial need of their clientele; they also lack human resource capacity to participate in the NBP; they exhibited low level application of modern technologies such as MIS as a result of their limited financial capacity; majority of the MFIs are not aware of biogas technology and its benefit to the society, the environment and the business opportunity for their own organisation provided through new loan product; even if there is lack of proper infrastructure which could result in higher interest rate for rural households compensating the resulting higher transaction cost, MFIs are not charging rural clients higher interest rate, they rather vary the interest rate based on the lending methodology, the type of loan products and repayment period which is the same for all rural, semi-urban and urban clients.

Main conclusions: without building their financial, human resource and institutional capacity, with their current limited capacity Ethiopia MFIs will find it difficult to participate in NBP; lack of awareness about biogas lead MFIs to think that providing loan for biogas user is a risky business and they put forward a number of pre-requisites and additional guarantee requirements for biodigesters for the sake of their own security; lack of awareness found out to be a low level problem that could be addressed by continuous training and awareness raising campaigns.