Literature review on effect of microfinance institutions on poverty in South Asian countries and their sustainability

Purpose - The authors present a systematic literature review on microfinance institutions’ (MFIs) effect on poverty and how they can ensure their sustainability. The purpose of this article is to review the effect of MFIs on poverty in South Asian countries. The analysis and review of the selected corpus of literature also provide avenues for future research. Design/methodology/approach - A total of 95 papers from 49 journals in 4 academic libraries and publishers were systematically studied and classified. The authors define the keywords and the inclusion/exclusion criteria for the identification of papers. The review includes an analysis of the selected papers that give insights about publications with respect to themes, number of themes covered in individual publications, nations, scope, methodology, number of methods used and publication trend. Findings - The literature indicates the positive effect of microfinance on poverty but with a varying degree on various categories of poor. The relation between poverty and microfinance is, however, dependent on the nation under the scanner. While sustainability and outreach co-exist, their trade-off is still a matter of debate. Originality/value - This is the first systematic literature review on MFIs’ effect on poverty in South Asian nations. Additionally, the authors discuss the literature on the trade-off between sustainability and outreach for MFIs.