the microfinance promise in the past decade microfinance programs have demonstrated that it is possible to lend to low income households while maintaining high repayment rates even without requiring collateral the programs promise a revolution in approaches to alleviating poverty and spreading financial services and millions of poor households are served globally a growing body of economic theory demonstrates how new contractual forms offer a key to microfinance success particularly the use of group lending contracts with joint liability for the most part however high repayment rates have not translated into profits and studies of impacts on poverty yield a mixed picture in describing emerging tensions the paper highlights the diversity of innovative mechanisms beyond group lending contracts the measurement of financial sustainability the estimation of economic and social impacts the costs and benefits of subsidization and the potential to reduce poverty through savings programs rather than just credit the promise of microfinance has pushed far ahead of the evidence and an agenda is put forward for addressing critical empirical gaps and sharpening the terms of policy discussion

microcredit and the poorest of the poor theory and evidence from bolivia abstract we construct a theoretical framework that describes the social worth of a microfinance organization in terms of the depth worth to users cost to users breadth length and scope of its output we then analyze evidence of depth of outreach for five microfinance organizations in bolivia most of the poor households reached by the microfinance organizations were near the poverty line they were the richest of the poor group lenders had more depth of outreach than individual lenders the urban poorest were more likely to be borrowers but rural borrowers were more likely to be among the poorest

optimal transition to renewable energy with threshold of irreversible pollution when cheap fossil energy is polluting and pollutant no longer absorbed beyond a certain concentration there is a moment when the introduction of a cleaner renewable energy although onerous is optimal with respect to inter temporal utility the cleaner technology is adopted either instantaneously or gradually at a controlled rate the problem of optimum under viability constraints is 6 dimensional under a continuous discrete dynamic controlled by energy consumption and investment into production of renewable energy viable optima are obtained either with gradual or with instantaneous adoption a longer time horizon increases the probability of adoption of renewable energy and the time for starting this adoption it also increases maximal utility and the probability to cross the threshold of irreversible pollution exploiting a renewable energy starts sooner when adoption is gradual rather than instantaneous the shorter the period remaining after adoption until the time horizon the higher the investment into renewable energy

viable ramsey economies the ramsey model of economic growth is revisited from the perspective of viability theory the ramsey model augmented with minimal consumption and sustainability criteria becomes a viability problem the framework allows for a clear picture of optimal viable optimal non viable and viable non optimal paths the drastic sacrifices in terms of present consumption required by the implementation of brundtland sustainability are visualized the rich countries bearing the major part of the burden the econometric analysis of viability sets enhances the role of technological progress in ensuring brundtland sustainability preference parameters such as the pure time preference rate are statistically non significant

do regulated microfinance institutions achieve better sustainability and outreach cross country evidence in spite of increasing pressure on microfinance institutions mfis operating in developing countries to transform into regulated financial intermediaries to date no study has investigated whether regulated mfis actually achieve better financial results and reach more poor clients than nonregulated mfis this article explores the impact of regulation on mfi performance using newly released data for 114 mfis from 62 countries in an empirical model where performance is specified as a function of mfi specific regulatory macroeconomic and institutional variables consistent with recent cross country evidence on the impact of banking regulations on bank performance barth et al 2004 this article finds that regulatory involvement does not directly affect performance either in terms of operational self sustainability or outreach the article also finds that less leveraged mfis have better sustainability the policy implication is that mfis transformation into regulated financial institutions is may not

the impact of ethnic diversity on microenterprise start ups until recently factors determining the decisions made by microfinance institutions mfis to extend loans to business start ups had not been explored recent evidence shows that mfi performance wi

depth of outreach and financial sustainability of microfinance institutions the primary justification for subsidizing microfinance institutions mfis is their enhancement of social welfare by extending credit to the poor households therefore recent emphasis on their financial self sufficiency has created concern that this may adversely affect the mission of social outreach utilizing data from 702 mfis operating in 83 countries this study shows empirical evidence of a positive complementary relationship between financial sustainability and depth of outreach

why the far distant future should be discounted at its lowest possible rate abstract a critical feature of the distant future is currently unresolvable uncertainty about what will then be the appropriate rate of return on capital to use for discounting this paper shows that there is a well defined sense in which the lowest possible interest rate should be used for discounting the far distant future part of any investment project some implications are discussed for evaluating long term environmental projects or activities like measures to mitigate the possible effects of global climate change

systemic risk reinsurance and the failure of crop insurance markets without affordable reinsurance private crop insurance markets are doomed to fail because systemic weather effects induce high correlation among farm level yields defeating insurer efforts to pool risks across farms using an empirical model of the u s crop insurance market we find that u s crop insurer portfolios are twenty to fifty times riskier than they would be otherwise if yields were stochastically independent across farms we also find that area yield reinsurance contracts would enable crop insurers to cover most of their systemic crop loss risk reducing their risk exposure to levels typically experienced by more conventional property liability insurers copyright 1997 oxford university press

financial performance and outreach a global analysis of leading microbanks microfinance contracts have proven able to secure high rates of loan repayment in the face of limited liability and information asymmetries but high repayment rates have not translated easily into profits for most microbanks profitability though is at the heart of the promise that microfinance can deliver poverty reduction while not relying on ongoing subsidy the authors examine why this promise remains unmet for most institutions using a data set with unusually high quality financial information on 124 institutions in 49 countries they explore the patterns of profitability loan repayment and cost reduction the authors find that institutional design and orientation matter substantially lenders that do not use group based methods to overcome incentive problems experience weaker portfolio quality and lower profit rates when interest rates are raised substantially for these individual based lenders one key to achieving profitability is investing more heavily in staff costs a finding consistent with the economics of information but contrary to the conventional wisdom that profitability is largely a function of minimizing cost

developing experience based premium rate discounts in crop insurance this article addresses the feasibility of implementing an experience based premium rate discount system in crop insurance while adverse selection and moral hazard in crop insurance have been extensively studied in the past discount systems or bonus malus incentives have not to our knowledge been investigated our empirical analysis indicates that a crop insurance discount system could be implemented based on a measure of favorable past insurance experience the estimated average discounts based on the rating methods developed in this study ranged from 5 to 9 depending on the crop being considered

outreach and performance of microfinance institutions the importance of portfolio yield in this paper we examine the interaction between social outreach and financial return in microfinance running multivariate regression models and using 1 805 observations of microfinance instituti

private crop insurers and the reinsurance fund allocation decision this research investigates the strategic behavior of private crop insurance firms reinsured by the usda through the standard reinsurance agreement this arrangement allows the private firm to strategically allocate individual policies into different risk sharing arrangements thus firm earnings are conditioned upon accurately forecasting policy loss experience our analysis begins with models investigating the characteristics explaining the placement of policies into the assigned risk fund then a simulation model of the sra is used to compare the post sra returns of actual firm allocations to two alternative allocation strategies based on a aggregate models and a policy level econometric

outreach sustainability and leverage in monitored and peer monitored lending abstract i study the contract design problem facing microfinance lending organizations mfos that want to maximize the impact and outreach of their lending activities to a target population of poor borrowers while remaining financially sustainable tradeoffs between outreach sustainability and financial leverage are shaped by the endogenous monitoring and delegation costs that arise within a chain of agency relationships subject to moral hazard between borrowers loan staff mfo equity owners and outside investors all else equal sustainable mfos that target poorer borrowers must charge higher interest rates have higher staff costs per dollar loaned and are less leveraged analysis of data for 72 mfos tends to support the findings

financial efficiency and social impact of microfinance institutions using self organizing maps summary this paper contributes to the literature by investigating whether the increased focus on financial self sustainability of microfinance institutions has been disadvantageous to the target audience we investigate the association between social efficiency and financial performance using a comprehensive data set that includes 650 microfinance institutions a self organizing map methodology is used to fully capture the existing heterogeneity among institutions the results show that we cannot support the hypothesis that there exists a trade off on the contrary we find evidence of a significant positive relationship between social efficiency and financial performance

rate making for farm level crop insurance implications for adverse selection this research identifies two problems in the new federal crop insurance that may cause adverse selection a the relationship between rate making and expected yields for individual farmers and b the bias introduced in coverage protection when trends are not used to establish expected yields a theoretical investigation using the normality assumption demonstrates the potential severity of these problems and empirical results from farm level data lend further support as crop insurance changes to individualized methods of protection these issues will be particularly important for developing rates

outreach and performance of microfinance institutions a panel analysis using a panel of 764 microfinance institutions mfis from 87 countries this study analyses the possible trade off between outreach and performance and shows that greater depth of outreach has a positive impact on the financial performance of an mfi the empirical results of this study should dispel the widely held apprehension that the recent emphasis on attainment of financial sustainability by the mfis could seriously impair their outreach efforts and shows that outreach to the poor can actually bolster financial performance

do women borrowers augment financial performance of mfis abstractthere is some consensus that depth of outreach and financial performance of microfinance institutions mfi are positively correlated a majority of microcredit borrowers are women and since the prevalence of female borrowers is even greater among the very poor there should be a positive correlation between female borrowers and financial performance most of the mfis target women as preferred borrowers however no study to date has investigated the relationship between targeting women and mfi s sustainability with respect to profitability and yield utilizing a panel of 892 mfis over a period of 10 years this study shows that increased proportion of women borrowers has a statistically significant positive impact on yield and financial performance of mfis consequently this article also analyses the implication as to whether female borrowers have better repayment rate than male borrowers

microfinance institutions transparency in sub saharan africa this study analyses the impact of the ownership structure and macro level factors on microfinance institutions mfis transparency in sub saharan africa ssa using cross sectional data from 223

are we consuming too much this paper articulates and applies frameworks for examining whether consumption is excessive we consider two criteria for the possible excessiveness or insufficiency of current consumption one is an intertemporal utility maximization criterion actual current consumption is deemed excessive if it is higher than the level of current consumption on the consumption path that maximizes the present discounted value of utility the other is a sustainability criterion which requires that current consumption be consistent with non declining living standards over time we extend previous theoretical approaches by offering a formula for the sustainability criterion that accounts for population growth and technological change in applying this formula we find that some poor regions of the world are failing to meet the sustainability criterion in these regions genuine wealth per capita is falling as investments in human and manufactured capital are not sufficient to offset the depletion of natural capital

adaptive policy framework through the lens of the viability theory a theoretical contribution to sustainability in the anthropocene era the earth is an evolutionary system that can be viewed as a social ecological system built around money sesm because of the coupling of the anthropocene era with globalization given the simultaneous environmental economic risks of total uncertainty and systemic aftermath several paradigmatic turns are required ecological economics is a cutting edge field that tackles this issue an integrative framework involving co evolutionary modelling offers methods for addressing the regulation issue that arises from the significant uncertainty driven by global economic and ecological risks we tackle the issue of adaptive policy for sesm regulation by answering the call for paradigmatic turns which leads us to support tychastic vs stochastic uncertainty in time adaptation vs optimal belated solutions viability vs stationary equilibrium and interdisciplinarity and participatory processes in modelling and policy action we describe step by step how to conceive sesm modelling through the lens of the mathematical viability theory mvt and we argue that this lens when adjusted for anticipatory and adaptive governance aag is relevant to examining sustainability for complex adaptive sesms from a local or global perspective

repayment performance in group based credit programs in bangladesh an empirical analysis abstract this paper analyzes the repayment rates of 128 credit groups belonging to three group based credit programs in bangladesh the association for social advancement asa the bangladesh rural advancement committee brac and the rangpur dinajpur rural service rdrs using tobit analysis specific tests are performed on the following hypothesized determinants group size size of loans degree of loan rationing enterprise mix within groups demographic characteristics social ties and status and occurrence of idiosyncratic shocks the paper concludes that if basic principles of prudential banking are adhered to repayment rates can be good even in poor and remote communities the important thing for financial institutions is to tailor services such that it becomes worthwhile for the poor to establish a profitable long term association in addition more freedom to members in the process of group formation is recommended

justifying social discounting the rank discounted utilitarian approach the popular discounted utilitarian criterion for infinite horizon social choice has been criticized on the ground that it treats successive generations unfairly i propose to evaluate intergenerational welfare with a rank discounted utilitarian rdu criterion instead the criterion amounts to discounted utilitarianism on non decreasing paths but it treats all generations impartially discounting becomes the mere expression of intergenerational inequality aversion i show that more inequality averse rdu societies have higher social discount rates when future generations are better off i apply the rdu approach in two benchmark economic growth models and i prove that it promotes sustainable policies maximizing discounted utility

practice what you preach microfinance business models and operational efficiency the microfinance sector has room for pure for profit microfinance institutions mfis non profit organizations and social for profit firms that aim to pursue a double bottom line depending on their business model these institutions target different types of borrowers change the size of their loans and adjust their loan pricing we introduce a simple approach that accommodates a wide range of business models and allows us to estimate the operational efficiency of mfis our empirical results show that mfis with a high depth of outreach are most efficient resulting in higher levels of outreach and profits for the same input mix

natural capital and sustainability abstract this paper develops and rigorously analyses a model describing the optimal use of natural capital in a utilitarian framework natural capital is treated as an aggregate including exhaustibles renewables and environmentals performing several functions it is found that it converges to a steady state in which it is kept constant by simultaneous investments and use

designing credit agent incentives to prevent mission drift in pro poor microfinance institutions abstract credit agents in microfinance institutions mfis must be given incentives to acquire information on potential borrowers and select them in accordance with the mfi s objectives we show that while giving incentives has no cost in for profit mfis it is costly in pro poor mfis when repayment and wealth are positively correlated a pro poor mfi cannot obtain the selection of poor clients in the proportion it wishes with incentives based solely on repayment it then becomes necessary to audit the share of very poor borrowers selected by an agent in order to provide the latter with adequate incentives when audit costs are large pro poor mfis may have to forego selection on wealth and use other targeting devices such as working in impoverished geographical locations driven by donor concerns with mission drift away from the poor audits on the wealth status of clients have been introduced at the level of mfis we show that introducing pro poor incentives requires extending such audits to the level of credit agents

financing microfinance institutions subsidies or deposit mobilisation abstractaccording to conventional wisdom dependence on subsidies cannot achieve the double bottom lines of microfinance institutions mfis outreach and financial sustainability the application of market based principles to microfinancing such as deposit mobilisation has been long suggested as an answer to this problem this paper documents the following findings regarding this issue first deposit mobilisation crowds out subsidies second subsidies and deposit mobilisation reduce microcredit interest rates and allow mfis to reach poorer borrowers third subsidies and deposit mobilisation worsen financial sustainability fourth subsidies reduce repayment rates while deposit mobilisation has no impact on repayment overall the results suggest that neither subsidies nor deposit mobilisation solve the traditional problem of trade off between outreach and financial sustainability

relaxing heteroscedasticity assumptions in area yield crop insurance rating this article focuses on the effect of differing heteroscedasticity assumptions on derived premium rates of area yield crop insurance tests of the proportional and absolute heteroscedasticity assumptions are conducted using both in sample and out of sample measures our results suggest that arbitrarily imposing a specific form of heteroscedasticity or homoscedasticity in insurance rate calculations limits actuarial soundness our results have practical implications for the federal crop insurance programs as we reject the traditional rating assumptions for many cotton regions and lower yielding higher risk corn and soybean counties but not in the heart of the cornbelt copyright 2011 oxford university press

optimal versus sustainable degrowth policies abstract this paper introduces a natural resource and pollution in a ramsey growth model which relies on the postulates of ecological economics it studies the impact of voluntary degrowth policies on production and welfare the instrument of these policies is a tax on the natural resource these public policies are implemented after the downturn of the households welfare following from the increased pollution two kinds of policies are considered and rely either on an optimality criterion or on an intergenerational equity criterion with respect to the laissez faire case they decrease both production and pollution but increase welfare classes of sustainable degrowth paths characterized by time constant or time increasing tax rates are determined