Estimating the Impact of Microcredit on Those Who Take It Up: Evidence from a Randomized Experiment in Morocco

54 Pages Posted: 18 May 2014 Last revised: 16 Jul 2015

See all articles by Bruno Crepon

Bruno Crepon

National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies (INSEE) - National School for Statistical and Economic Administration (ENSAE); IZA Institute of Labor Economics

Florencia Devoto

Paris School of Economics (PSE)

Esther Duflo

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) - Department of Economics; Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL); National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER); Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR); Bureau for Research and Economic Analysis of Development (BREAD)

William Pariente

Catholic University of Louvain (UCL)

Multiple version iconThere are 2 versions of this paper

Date Written: May 13, 2014

Abstract

This paper reports the results from a randomized evaluation of a microcredit program introduced in rural areas of Morocco starting in 2006 by Al Amana, the country’s largest microfinance institution. Al Amana was the only MFI operating in the study areas during the evaluation period. Thirteen percent of the households in treatment villages took a loan, and none in control villages. Among households identified as more likely to borrow based on ex-ante characteristics, microcredit access led to a significant rise in investment in assets used for self-employment activities (mainly animal husbandry and agriculture), and an increase in profit. But this increase in profit was offset by a reduction in income from casual labor, so overall there was no gain in measured income or consumption. We find suggestive evidence that these results are mainly driven by effects on borrowers, rather than by externalities on households that do not borrow. This implies that among those who chose to borrow, microcredit had large, albeit very heterogeneous, impacts on assets and profits from self-employment activities, but small impact on consumption: we can reject an increase in consumption of more than 10% among borrowers, two years after initial rollout.

Keywords: Microfinance, microcredit

JEL Classification: O16, G21, D21

Suggested Citation

Crepon, Bruno and Devoto, Florencia and Duflo, Esther and Pariente, William, Estimating the Impact of Microcredit on Those Who Take It Up: Evidence from a Randomized Experiment in Morocco (May 13, 2014). MIT Department of Economics Working Paper No. 14-14, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2438038 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2438038

Bruno Crepon

National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies (INSEE) - National School for Statistical and Economic Administration (ENSAE) ( email )

92245 Malakoff Cedex
France

IZA Institute of Labor Economics

P.O. Box 7240
Bonn, D-53072
Germany

Florencia Devoto

Paris School of Economics (PSE) ( email )

48 Boulevard Jourdan
Paris, 75014 75014
France

Esther Duflo (Contact Author)

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) - Department of Economics ( email )

50 Memorial Drive
Room E52-544
Cambridge, MA 02139
United States
617-258-7013 (Phone)
617-253-6915 (Fax)

Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL) ( email )

Cambridge, MA
United States

HOME PAGE: http://www.povertyactionlab.org/

National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)

1050 Massachusetts Avenue
Cambridge, MA 02138
United States

Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR)

London
United Kingdom

Bureau for Research and Economic Analysis of Development (BREAD) ( email )

Duke University
Durham, NC 90097
United States

William Pariente

Catholic University of Louvain (UCL) ( email )

Place Montesquieu, 3
Louvain-la-Neuve, 1348
Belgium

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