IOSR Journal of Humanities And Social Science (IOSR-JHSS) Volume 26, Issue 1, Series 2 (January. 2021) 32-45 e-ISSN: 2279-0837, p-ISSN: 2279-0845. www.iosrjournals.org DOI: 10.9790/0837-2601023245 www.iosrjournals.org 32 |Page Influence of Women’s Participation in Self -Help Groups on Their Access to Credit in Tigania West Sub-County Peter Maina 1 , Dr Catherine N. Munyua 2 & Dr Agnes Nkurumwa 3 1 is the corresponding author 2,3 are lecturers are lecturers at Egerton University Abstract The purpose of this study was to determine the influence of participation of women in self-help groups on access to credit in Tigania west Sub-County, Meru County, Kenya.The study used descriptive and explorative research designs. The descriptive research design was utilized for the purposes of describing the research phenomenon as it is on the ground without any manipulation of the variables. The explorative research design on the other hand was key in enabling an exploration of relationships among variables (Mugenda & Mugenda, 2003). In this study it has been used to discover the link the women participation in self-help group on the social economic empowerment. Target population was all women in self-help groups in Tigania West Sub-County. The target population was 3610 women from 250 registered self-help groups. Sampling frame of the 250 registered self-help groups for women was obtained from the Ministry of Labour and Social Protection, Department of Social Development in Tigania West Sub-County. The number of women in the 250 groups was 3610. Sample size was determined using a formula by Nassiuma (2008) which derived 150 respondents. The results indicated that women participation in self-help groups had influence on credit access of the women. This was attributed to the p value (0.000) which is less than 0.05. This led to the rejection of the null hypothesis. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date of Submission: 26-12-2020 Date of Acceptance: 07-01-2021 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I. INTRODUCTION 1.1 Background of the Study The women participation in self-help groups has been established to have diverse effect on their social economic empowerment aspects including self-confidence, social networks, access to credit and income levels. The self-confidence of the women members is often associated with the self-help groups through interactions with group members, exposure to a wide variety of skills and masterly of specific tasks that are undertaken within the self-help groups. The self-help groups also create and enhance social networks amongst the women (Al-Hebaish, 2012). This is through the interaction with members, bonding and joint undertaking of various activities together. Through these processes the women develop social relationships amongst themselves. The women participation in self-help groups have enabled them to access credit through group lending and revolving loans amongst the members (Aikarua, Sumari & Maleko, 2014). The self-help groups create social security that enables the lending from financial institutions to the group in which they guarantee each other. The social ties amongst the group members enables the provision of the revolving loans in which the individual members are issued with loans and then thereafter other members are issued with loans after loan repayments (Manjunatha, 2013). The self-help groups enable different members to undertake diverse economic activities together thus improving on the economic wellbeing of the individual members. Amongst the economic activities that women engage in include small-scale trade activities such as weaving, poultry keeping, and making of detergents amongst others (Hora, 2014). Despite the fact that there are benefits associated with women’s participati on in self-help groups, there was no empirical evidence about women access to credit in Tigania West Sub-County. This necessitated this research to explore the women participation levels and economic empowerment in Tigania West Sub-County. 1.2 Purpose of the Study The purpose of this study was to determine the influence of participation of women in self-help groups on access to credit in Tigania west Sub-County, Meru County, Kenya. 1.3 Objective of the Study The objectives of this study were to establish the influence of women’s participation in self-help groups on their access to credit in Tigania West Sub-County.