Abstract:
Women entrepreneurs play a pivotal role in the socio economic development and poverty reduction process of any economy in terms of employment generation, growth of GDP, innovation, equitable income distribution, resource utilization and regional development. Sufficient finance is needed In order to encourage women entrepreneurs. Most of the women entrepreneurs are not willing to take financial aids from formal financial institutes due to lack of access and it has been a major barrier to the development of the sector. Hence, this study is focus to find the factors which affect on women entrepreneurs' access to finance. The objectives of the study aim to find the relationship between the formal financing dimensions of the women entrepreneurs' access to finance. Then, determine formal financing dimensions impact on women entrepreneurs' access to finance, and finally, determine the most and least important formal financing dimension factor that influence to the women entrepreneurs' access to finance. The study conducted through firms which have been registered under Colombo, Gampaha and kaluthara district's Chamber of Commerce and Industry. A structured questionnaire was designed and administered to collect the data and the sample consisted from 100 women entrepreneurs. Women entrepreneurs' demographic factors are used to increase the research scope. Research methodology consisted of a model constructed by the author to measure influencing factors for formal financing that includes entrepreneur's characteristics, firm characteristics, access to business information and policies and procedures. The results from the study reveal that women entrepreneurs' access to finance is highly affected by the firm characteristics, and policies and procedures. When it is further describing, factors like', years of business, size, operation sector and location of firm, paper works, repayment condition and collateral requirements are mainly influenced to women entrepreneurs' formal financial decisions. Therefore, based on above findings it can be suggested that formal finance institutes, should more close to women entrepreneurs' firms, should reduce their processes and pre requirements when issuing credit and the repayment procedures should also be easy to women entrepreneurs' firms. Hence, formal financial institutes should consider more regarding the above mentioned factors relating to women entrepreneurs. Finally, research findings are assisted to the academies and to formal financial institutes' managers when they make decisions regarding women entrepreneurs.
