Tuesday Jul 21, 2026
Tuesday Jul 21, 2026
Tuesday, 21 July 2026 05:31 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}
Women-owned and women-led micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (WMSMEs) accounted for outstanding business loans of Rs. 559 billion as at end-March 2026, representing 28% of the nearly Rs. 2 trillion MSME loan portfolio reported by 12 domestic banks under Sri Lanka’s Women Entrepreneurs Finance (WE Finance) Code.
The report also showed that women entrepreneurs secured Rs. 145.5 billion in new business loans during the first year of the WE Finance Code. Based on data from 11 participating domestic banks, women accounted for 26,087, or 30%, of more than 120,000 MSME business loans approved during 2025/26. In value terms, lending to women-led businesses represented 20% of the Rs. 709.84 billion in total MSME loans approved.
According to the inaugural Implementation of the WE Finance Code in the Sri Lanka Annual Report 2025/26, women entrepreneurs held nearly 46% of the 1.7 million outstanding MSME business loan accounts reported by participating domestic banks. However, by value, lending to women-led businesses accounted for just over a quarter of the total outstanding MSME portfolio.
The outstanding MSME portfolio represents around one-fifth of total private sector credit extended by domestic banking units, which rose by Rs. 259.9 billion, or 2.6% month-on-month, to Rs. 10.14 trillion at end-March 2026.
Launched in March 2025 under the Finance, Planning and Economic Development Ministry with technical assistance from the Asian Development Bank (ADB), the WE Finance Code made Sri Lanka the first country in South Asia to adopt the global initiative aimed at improving financial inclusion for women entrepreneurs.
The report said the first year of implementation saw 13 State and private sector financial institutions join the Code, while the introduction of Sri Lanka’s first unified national definition for women-owned and women-led MSMEs established a common framework for identifying, collecting, and reporting data across the financial sector.
The Central Bank of Sri Lanka (CBSL), acting as the National Data Aggregator, has also introduced a standardised framework for reporting gender-disaggregated MSME lending data to support evidence-based policymaking and improve access to finance for women entrepreneurs.
Looking ahead, the report identified improving data quality, measuring unmet demand for finance, integrating informal enterprises into formal data systems, and broadening participation among financial institutions as key priorities for expanding the reach of the initiative.
