Digital Finance for Household Finances

This research introduces a novel dataset on digital payments, uniquely linked to track both urban and rural households in their dual roles as producers and consumers. This research aims to leverage these data, alongside tailored focus groups, field surveys, and existing secondary sources, to investigate how digital financial products might better address liquidity constraints and consumption-smoothing challenges — long-standing issues at the intersection of household income and consumption decisions, particularly in contexts where low-income households operate as microenterprises. The research further seeks to test whether scalable interventions, integrated into existing digital finance infrastructure, can enhance households' ability to manage such constraints. The analysis centers on three key contexts: (1) working capital investments for urban microenterprises; (2) climate adaptation loans for agricultural households; and (3) digital remittances and risk-sharing mechanisms for households spanning urban and rural areas.