On the example of a commercial microfinance institution (MFI) in Tanzania this paper investigates first whether agricultural firms have a different probability to get a loan and whether their loans are differently volume rationed than loans to non-agricultural firms. Second, we analyze whether...

Weather risk is one of the main causes for income fluctuation in agriculture. Since 1997, the economic consequences of weather risk can be insured with weather derivatives, which are offered for many different weather events, such as temperature, rainfall, snow or hurricanes. It is well known...

Crop insurance products can improve and stabilize economic performance. However, due to insurance market imperfections, the use of insurance products often requires governmental support. This paper analyses the actual impact of insurance products on the economic performance of cropping farms by...

The paper evaluates the effectiveness of several index-based crop insurance schemes by comparing results from two alternative evaluation approaches. We apply the common ex post approach from the literature by specifying and evaluating insurance contracts by means of the data for the same...

This article develops an Indifference Pricing model for a weather derivative that is traded over the counter. The model is used to calculate ask and bid prices for a put option on a weather index in Germany. We find that under moderate risk aversion the maximal bid prices of grain producers...

The study introduces an ex-ante evaluation concept into the analysis of weather-based index insurance effectiveness. We conduct our ex ante analysis by distinguishing between two consecutive periods: the first period is used for determining insurance parameters and optimal number of insurance...

The study evaluates the effectiveness of a catastrophic drought-index insurance developed by applying two alternative methods - the standard regression analysis and the copula approach. Most empirical analyses obtain estimates of the dependence of crop yields on weather by employing linear...

The application of yield time series in risk analysis prerequisites the estimation of technological trend which might be present in the data. In this paper, we show that in presence of highly volatile yield time series and non-constant technology, the consideration of the weather effect in the...

Kazakhstan and Germany have different development levels of the agricultural sector. One of the explanations for this fact might be the different investment behavior of farmers in the two countries. In this study, we experimentally compare the investment behavior of farmers in the two countries...