Factors affecting youth participation in village savings and loans associations in Nyeibingo parish

Abstract

This research study was carried out to investigate factors that affect youth participation in VSLAs in the area of the study. This research tended to examine how factors like age, gender, family size, religion, employment status, income and education level of the youth impact his/her membership status in VSLAs. Multi stage and purposive sampling were used to get primary data. A sample of size 100 youth was used and this was calculated using Yamane’s formula. Simple random sampling was applied to draw samples from the three villages selected. Data was collected using Kobo collect software. Analysis of collected data was done using Stata version 15.0. Binary logistic regression analysis was used to examine factors that affect youth participation in VSLA groups. From the findings, 60% of the youth interviewed were members of VSLA groups and of these 28 were females while 38 were males. Age, duration and loan history of the youth significantly affected youth participation in VSLAs. As one grows old by a year the odds of becoming a member of any VSLA group increases by a factor 1.4325. Youth that had ever obtained loans from related financial groups were 123.046 times more likely to participate in VSLA groups in comparison to those that had never obtained loans. The number of years spent in one group triggers an increase in VSLA group by a factor of 0.4419. This study recommended the youth that weren’t members of the village savings and loans association to join regardless of their education level and age so that they may also enjoy the benefits of these savings groups.