Unlocking Finance for Women Entrepreneurs in the Caribbean: Challenges and Opportunities

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Imagine this scenario…

She had been running her business for ten years. Loyal customers. A solid business plan. She went to the bank for a loan. She was told she needed to deposit 50% of the loan amount in cash — just to be considered. She didn’t have it. She went back to bootstrapping.

This isn’t about personal failure. It’s about a system that failed her.

Access to finance for women entrepreneurs in the Caribbean remains one of the most persistent and consequential barriers to economic growth across the region. DevSolutions recently completed a first-of-its-kind Flagship Study on Access to Finance for Women-led MSMEs in The Bahamas, Belize, Jamaica, and Saint Lucia — commissioned by the Caribbean Development Bank and funded by the ICR Facility. Find the full study here.

Here’s what the data actually shows.

Challenges Accessing Finance for Women Entrepreneurs in the Caribbean

A surprisingly high percentage of women-owned businesses appear in the data as “not credit constrained” — implying they have no issue accessing financing. The reality? Many women have simply stopped trying. The barriers are still very much present. Women entrepreneurs across the Caribbean routinely face:

•       Prohibitive collateral requirements: Banks regularly demand collateral worth up to twice the loan value. In Jamaica, 59% of all early-stage entrepreneurial activity involves women — yet only 2% of Jamaican women hold land titles, which is the primary collateral most banks require. This near-total mismatch shuts out the majority of women entrepreneurs before they even begin.

•       Limited and inaccessible credit options: Loan application processes that take up to a year, application experiences described as “invasive and fraught with gender disparity,” and a lack of financial products designed for women’s business realities all contribute to widespread disengagement. Opting out has become a rational choice for many.

•       A staggering regional funding gap: The IDB estimates the financing gap for women-led businesses in Latin America and the Caribbean at $93 billion. Every unfunded viable business is a job not created, a business not expanded, a community not supported.

•       No agreed regional definition: Across all four countries studied, there is still no agreed regional definition of a “woman-owned business” — meaning programs designed to support them can’t reliably identify who they’re serving or track progress over time.

Why This Matters for Business Growth and the Caribbean Economy

Women entrepreneurs aren’t looking for handouts — they’re looking for a fair shot. And the data makes a compelling case for giving them one. Women who do receive funding repay at higher rates than their male counterparts. The clients financial institutions are most reluctant to serve may be their most reliable. Beyond individual businesses, closing the finance gap for women entrepreneurs would unlock billions in economic activity, create jobs, and strengthen the resilience of Caribbean communities. Keeping women out of formal finance doesn’t just limit their businesses — it limits the entire regional economy.

Practical Funding Opportunities and What Needs to Change

Positive Developments

There are encouraging examples already demonstrating what’s possible. JN Bank in Jamaica is positioning itself as a leader in gender finance — 72% of its small business loans go to women-led MSMEs, backed by financial products actually designed for them. The IFC–Caribbean Development Bank DigiLab Finance initiative could open significant new doors for women entrepreneurs if its initial positive results continue to hold.

Key Recommendations from the Research

The study is clear on what needs to happen:

✔   Changing institutional mindsets and perceptions of women-led MSMEs

✔   Mandatory reporting of bank lending by gender

✔   Smarter and more flexible collateral frameworks

✔   Set-asides for women-led MSMEs in government procurement

✔   Actionable strategies to implement the WE-Finance Code across the Caribbean

Research also flags remaining gaps: longitudinal data on WMSME transitions, tackling the “double barrier” of informality and gender-based norms, and ensuring digital finance tools are actually reaching women in rural communities.

From Research to Action: The Trust Imperative

The elephant in the room is trust. Women entrepreneurs don’t trust that governments will follow through. Many aren’t convinced that banks see them as viable clients.

Building trust requires consistent delivery of results. It starts with small, visible wins: making existing tax and other concessions easier to access, expanding capacity-building programs to rural and informal businesses, and financing opportunity-based innovators.

DevSolutions is actively looking to collaborate with partners who want to move the study’s findings from paper to practice.

Over to You

What access-to-finance solutions are you seeing on the ground that are working — and that are replicable and scalable?

Let’s talk. 🚀