1. MSME Classification (Micro, Small, Medium)

Kenyan law defines MSMEs based on annual turnover. However, turnover data is not consistent. To ensure consistency and accuracy, the dashboard applies a structured classification process that uses turnover where available and loan size as a proxy where it is not.

1.1 MSME Thresholds

Based on the Micro and Small Enterprises Act (2012) and national MSME surveys, the turnover bands are:

All dashboards classify borrowers using four gender categories:

• Female-Owned
• Male-Owned
• Jointly Owned
• Unknown

Gender is assigned as follows:

• Individual borrowers: The loan is attributed to the registered borrower’s gender.
• Businesses: A business is classified as:
  • Female-Owned if women own at least 51%
  • Male-Owned if men own at least 51%
  • Jointly Owned if neither reaches 51%
  • Unknown if ownership or gender data is unavailable

This classification is applied consistently across all gender-disaggregated dashboards.

The dashboard also supports an age lens built from each borrower's year of birth. Age is not treated as a fixed current-age attribute. Instead, it is recalculated against the reporting period of each loan record so that historical views remain reproducible over time.

3.1 Age calculation approach

• The source data provides a borrower year of birth.
• The dashboard calculates age as: reporting year minus year of birth.
• The reporting period is the record's own reporting month, which means a loan reported in an earlier year is bucketed using that earlier reporting year, not today's date.
• This preserves historical consistency, so the same record stays in the same age context when analysing a past month.

3.2 Adult age bands used in the dashboard

Once age is calculated, records are grouped into fixed adult bands used consistently across charts, tooltips, exports, and story insights:

3.3 Interpretation of the youth lens

For youth-focused storytelling, the dashboard combines the 18-24 and 25-34 bands into a single youth segment. All older known age bands are grouped as the rest of the portfolio.

The dashboard highlights the gender gap, shown as Male minus Female.

For each selected metric (such as loan value, number of loans, or number of borrowers):

• Only Male-Owned and Female-Owned loans are included
• Joint and Unknown categories are excluded
• Shares are calculated for male-owned and female-owned portfolios
• The gender gap is the difference between these two shares and is presented in percentage points

NPL indicators on the Loan Performance pages reflect the full loan portfolio in scope, not only MSME-specific products.

A loan is classified as non-performing if:

• It is 90 days or more in arrears, or
• It falls under prudential risk categories: Substandard, Doubtful, or Loss

Loan performance is grouped into five categories: Normal, Watch, Substandard, Doubtful, and Loss. These classifications form the basis of all NPL ratios and trends shown in the dashboard.