Topics in Middle Eastern and African Economies Proceedings of Middle East Economic Association Vol. 22, Issue No. 1, May 2020 Financial Inclusion and Extreme Poverty in The MENA Region: A Gap Analysis Approach Noha Emara1, Ph.D. Associate Professor Economics Department Helwan University, Egypt Rutgers University, USA Mahmoud Mohieldin2, Ph.D. Professor Cairo University and World Bank Group JEL Classification Numbers: C23; G21; O43 Keywords: Financial Inclusion; Extreme Poverty; MENA Region SDGs; Gap Approach 1 Email:
[email protected] 2 The views expressed in this paper are those of the co-author and should not be attributed to the institutions he is affiliated with. 192 Abstract Eradicating extreme poverty – $1.90 per day international poverty line – remains one of the main, but challenging Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in the Middle East and North African (MENA) region. As per the latest World Bank statistics of 2018, extreme poverty in the MENA region has increased from 2.7% to 5% over the period from 2013 to 2015. The region ranks as the third highest in the developing regions and has fell short of reducing extreme poverty to half by the year 2015. Using system GMM dynamic panel estimation methodology on annual data for eleven MENA countries and twenty-three Emerging Markets (EMs) over the period 1990 - 2017, the first part of the study estimates the role of financial inclusion – using measures of access and usage – in eradicating extreme poverty (the first goal of SDG). The second part of the study employs a gap analysis to predict the ability of the MENA and EMs countries to achieve the extreme poverty goal by the year 2030 by depending only on the improvement in financial services and no other factors.