Ms. Sima Kamil

Deputy Governor State Bank of Pakistan

Ms Sima Kamil was appointed as the Deputy Governor of SBP by the Federal Government on August 25, 2020 for a period of 3 years with immediate effect. She assumed her responsibilities on August 26, 2020.

Ms. Kamil is the first woman appointed as Deputy Governor of SBP. She has over 35 years of experience in diverse fields of commercial banking, including Branch Banking; SMEs, Rural, Consumer and Corporate financing; and, investment banking. She has worked in various international banks including American Express Bank, ANZ Grindlays Bank and Standard Chartered Bank in areas of Corporate Banking and Risk Management.

Please tell us about SBP Policy on Reducing the Gender Gap in Financial Inclusion?

Financial inclusion demands that men and women get equal opportunities to access and use formal financial services suited to their Currently, women are disproportionately under-served by the country’s financial system as they have far fewer bank accounts than is reasonable given that they are about half the adult population. This disparity impedes Pakistan’s national economic development. The goal of the proposed policy is to reduce the gender gap in financial inclusion. The policy is based on the premise that gender-neutral policies in the financial sector have been insufficient to reduce the gender gap in the financial sector and there is a pressing need to view financial sector policies through gender intentional policies.

What is the main driver of this policy?

Promoting equal opportunities for women and men for accessing and pursuing financial and professional endeavors is critical for sustainable and inclusive economic growth in any country. Improved gender parity in financial and economic opportunities can enhance socio-economic development outcomes for not just the present but future generations. Better opportunities for women to earn and control income has been demonstrated to contribute to broader economic development in developing economies. Gender equality is also a United Nations Sustainable Development Goal (SDG-5), and ultimately, a country’s success for empowering women rests on a gender responsive approach in its public policy management and implementation, including its financial policies. In this regard, women’s equal access to financial services becomes a priority for a country like Pakistan whose population of 207.8 million4 includes 49% women, who largely lag behind men in terms of financial inclusion and contribution to economic activity.

What actions SBP would expect from banks?

Policy will aim to focus on following 5 key pillars:

Improving gender diversity: A financial institution cannot adequately address the female market segment without addressing its internal gender imbalance. Currently only 13% of the staff of banks and 1% of branchless banking agents are women. More women working in leadership positions at financial institutions can also aid the development of policies and practices for improving gender balance across the financial sector as well as developing women friendly products and services. Targets will be assigned to Financial Institutions for internal gender balance over a 3 year period.
Women centric products and services: To shift from gender neutral to gender inclusive product design, it is imperative that a dedicated team is working on gender-segmented product designing and creating a business case, while understanding the existing social norms, and marketing products Therefore, FI’s shall create a specialized department within 6 months of issuance of this policy, to apply gender lens on existing and new products and services offerings, keeping in view various use cases within women demographics of all ages and life cycle stages. They may also collaborate with the incubation centers in providing awareness and marketing about their digital financial products & services.
Women’s Champions at all customer touchpoints: Women’s financial inclusion cannot be improved without understanding their needs with careful Women customers especially entrepreneurs, feel intimidated to visit a bank branch and are not facilitated effectively. Therefore, to enable banks to improve facilitation of women customers and entrepreneurs, Women Champions shall be deployed at all customer touch points. They should proactively guide the women entrepreneurs to have an access to credit. Further, all other virtual touch points of the banks, including call centers, apps and alternate delivery channels should aim to be more women friendly. This goal will be incrementally driven over time.
Robust collection of Gender-disaggregated data and target setting: The absence of data and targets can dilute FI’s focus on the gender in finance, and impede development of informed policies and associated actions for closing the gender gap. Therefore, under the policy, all institutions under SBP’s ambit will be instructed to collect and report gender disaggregated data related to gender disaggregated outreach of products and services, to SBP. The data collection will also help FIs to recognize the opportunities and challenges in women’s financial inclusion, and help them in developing internal policies to comply with SBP’s gender policy and targets. Furthermore, SBP will also strengthen its own research on gender and develop tools in line with international best practices for impact assessment.
Policy Forum on Gender: To discuss opportunities and challenges in women’s financial inclusion, internalize gender mainstreaming within organizations, and review the existing legal and policy framework for identification of bottlenecks in women’s financial inclusion, a Policy Forum on Gender and Finance will be established at The forum will be chaired by SBP Governor, include members from Banks, DFIs, MFBs, SECP, women chambers of commerce, civil society, private sector, gender leaders etc. and will meet at least bi- annually to serve as apex forum for future policy formulation on gender. The forum will also create space for innovations that support greater women’s financial inclusion. Going forward, under the Forum, SBP will host annual conferences for knowledge sharing, plenary discussions on Gender and Finance, and awards will be given to those banks that have made significant efforts to close the gender gap in finance.

Who all will be affected by this policy?

The policy recommendations will be applicable on SBP’s regulated entities including Commercial Banks, Islamic Banks, Microfinance Banks (MFBs), Development Finance Institutions (DFIs) and Electronic Money Institutions (EMIs) etc. Further the SBP will work with other Regulators to align these steps in the interest of collaboration and national results.

What is the current status of this policy

SBP has published its draft policy on its website to seek feedback of all stakeholders. We are compiling all inputs as well as holding consultative sessions. The Final policy will be released within March 2021.

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