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The soil that Abdoulaye Ndiaye holds in his hand is dry and dusty. A little further away in the Kaolack region the groundnut plants are already beginning to spring up in the fields, but in Paskoto village Abdoulaye and his fellow farmers have not seen a drop so far this season. "The most important challenge for us is the weather. It is God who decides. We have no choice, but are just left looking for ways to handle the situation," Abdoulaye says, now using his hand to shield his eyes against the stark sunlight.
For Jeremiah Kithaka, farming maize on his three acre farmland is the primary source of livelihood enabling him to provide for his family of four. However, with changing rainfall patterns, delayed starts to the rainy seasons and longer and more frequent dry periods, Jeremiah has seen vast volatility in his income levels over the past few years.
Niyitegeka Veneranda, 55 ans, est agricultrice au Rwanda. Elle a sept enfants et cinq petits-enfants. Alors qu’elle possède moins d’un hectare de terrain avec son mari, elle a réussi a construire une petite maison, à nourrir sa famille et à envoyer se trois plus jeunes enfants à l’école. Grâce à une assurance agricole, elle a obtenu un prêt d’une banque locale qui lui a permis d’accroître sa production de riz, et elle prévoit de demander un autre prêt l’année prochaine pour étendre encore sa surface cultivable.
Fifty-five year old Niyitegeka Veneranda lives in rural Rwanda. She and her husband are parents to seven children and grandparents to five. They farm less than a hectare of their own land, yet she has been able to build a small house, feed her family, and send her last three children to school. She expanded her rice production recently with a loan from a local bank made possible through agricultural insurance, and plans to expand her acreage with another loan next year.
Job creation and economic growth through private sector development have become primary areas of focus for policy makers around the world in the aftermath of the global financial crisis. Recent evidence points to the importance of small and medium enterprises (SMEs)1 in providing employment across countries. In addition to employing the largest number of people in aggregate, SMEs generate the most new jobs (Ayyagari et al., 2011). But SMEs also face many challenges in day-to-day operations and to grow. Access to finance is often cited as one of the primary obstacles that affect SMEs...
What innovations can help bankers in developing countries who wish to finance agricultural small and medium enterprises (SMEs)? This report tries to answer this question by isolating promising cases of emergent and innovative financing, risk mitigation, and distribution models. The paper identifies key elements observed across case studies. In the report, case studies are documented, models are observed, and patterns are determined. The report primarily addresses private sector financial institutions in developing countries and therefore focuses on models from the private sector perspective.
As Rwandan farmers face increasingly erratic rainfall, an innovative program launched today will use automated weather stations to offer 20,000 farmers in the Southern and Western provinces of Rwanda low-cost insurance to protect their loans for high-yielding seeds, fertilizers, and other farm inputs.
IFC, a member of the World Bank Group through its Global Index Insurance Facility (GIIF), has entered into a project agreement with SANASA Insurance Company Ltd, to support the development and use of flexible and affordable weather index insurance products to help minimize the impact of crop losses due to floods or droughts on farmer livelihoods. The project objective is to expand access to insurance for food crops such as rice and in turn offer protection for up to 15,000 small-scale farmers against weather-related risks and natural disasters. The project will also raise awareness amongst 50...
* World Bank announces $1.7 million funding for program * Designed to insure against hurricanes like Sandy in 2012 By Susana Ferreira PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti, Jan 29 (Reuters) - When Hurricane Sandy struck Haiti late last year, the home Guerda Pierre shares with her three children and mother in Cabaret, north of Port-au-Prince, was flooded - and so was the merchandise she sold to make a living. "The books, the food, everything was wet after Sandy," said Pierre. The plantain plants and beans in her garden were also destroyed. But unlike the majority of Haitians, Pierre had an insurance policy.
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