In an interview with the GIIF Team, Aaltje de Roos, Senior Policy Advisor - Department for Sustainable Economic Development at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands, explains why the Netherlands provides substantial donor support for agri-insurance programs in developing countries, including the World Bank Group's Global Index Insurance Facility. Q: What role would the Netherlands like to see the World Bank Group, and specifically GIIF, play in the agri-insurance field over the next 5-10 years? A: The World Bank Group, and GIIF especially, can boost the private insurance branch in

Farmers know that there will be years when the crop yields are reduced, or prices will be low. Perhaps they will diversify their crops, depend on livestock, or purchase a system to irrigate their crops. All these are ways to mitigate and reduce their risks. When there is no insurance culture or trust in insurance companies -and insurance companies themselves may not have extensive experience selling agricultural insurance - there is understandably little interest to purchase crop insurance. In such cases, it is the government who is the de facto insurer because crop losses of more than 50

MANILA, Philippines, October 23, 2014—The World Bank group this week brought together trade and agriculture officials from Africa, Asia, and Latin America with experts and private sector representatives for an international dialogue on how to overcome key trade barriers along agribusiness supply chains. The peer-to-peer learning event, titled “Leveraging Opportunities for Agri-Food Agencies in the Post Bali Era” and held in Manila October 22 and 23, aimed to help developing countries build efficient trade logistics systems and services that facilitate agribusiness trade while ensuring food

PlaNet Guarantee, member of the PlaNet Finance Group, and the GIIF come together to launch the first regional management platform for index insurance. The objective is to cover 60 000 farmers in West Africa by 2015. While agriculture remains the main economic sector in West Africa (on average 30% of the GDP of countries in the region and 70% of the workforce), no risk management tool is offered to farmers to secure their income. In case of drought, floods, or due to other factors that could cause a significant drop in yields, farmers currently receive no form of protection. The traditional