Rural Banks Can Reduce Poverty: Experimental Evidence from 870 Indian Villages - Household Data

For more than one decade, researchers have worked with Kshetriya Gramin Financial Services (KGFS) on a large-scale experimental evaluation of the impact of improved access to formal financial services for rural populations. The team used a randomized controlled trial running from 2009 to 2016 to analyze the impact of services from an innovative rural bank in India that founded its operations on a new set of principles: broad geographical distribution, a low banker-to-client ratio, and a wide variety of products offered, including savings and insurance. The researchers measured impacts on poverty reduction, entrepreneurship, social networks, health, agricultural investments, and female empowerment.

The Household Survey was conducted through multiple rounds at Baseline and multiple rounds at Endline. It is divided into 23 modules (referred to as sections), each containing a set of questions administered to the household roster on a particular aspect, i.e. farming activities, occupations (self-employment and wage labor), consumption, shocks, income and assets, and usage of financial services (formal and informal). The survey also administers questions to the woman in the household (preferably a married woman with children). We collect data on her (and her children's) health, decision making abilities within the household, and her social network and complement this data by notions about risk aversion, trust, and bargaining behavior.