Financial institution

CelsiusPro AG is a global weather risk management player and winner of the 2009 Swiss Insurance Award for Innovation. The company has a history of structuring and distributing weather solutions via its proprietary platform. CelsiusPro offers a large number of standardized contracts and fully customized solutions on weather parameters such as precipitation, temperature, snow, sun hours and wind. Customizing weather hedges across all weather dependent industries leverages structuring expertise. Data from official weather stations is used for weather products for price calculations, contract specifications and payout conditions; currently over 2500 weather stations across the globe are available. The internet based weather platform allows efficient execution (price calculation and purchase), reporting and settlement for multi stakeholder schemes.

In collaboration with colleagues in the Sustainable Development Network and across the Bank, ARD works to reduce poverty through sustainable rural development. To this end, ARD provides analytical and advisory services to the Bank's regions on a wide range of agriculture and rural development topics.

These services include the preparation and implementation of the ARD Action Plan, monitoring of the Bank's portfolio of agriculture and rural projects, and promoting knowledge sharing among agriculture and rural development practitioners, inside and outside the Bank, in order to continually improve the Bank's activities in rural areas.

Implementing Agriculture for Development, World Bank Group Agriculture Action Plan: FY2010-12 is the follow up to the broad consensus represented by World Development Report 2008: Agriculture for Development. It outlines the scaled-up World Bank Group commitment to support the improvement of agriculture’s contribution to food security, to raise the incomes of the poor, to facilitate economic transformation, and to provide environmental services. It builds upon previous themes found in Reaching the Rural Poor, the 2003 Agriculture and Rural Development Strategy. 

Following the insights of the World Development Report 2008: Agriculture for Development, it gives greater attention to:

• Increasing agricultural productivity, especially of poor smallholders, for greater progress in rural poverty alleviation;
• Differentiating the mix of support across the three “country worlds” of agriculture; and
• The role of agriculture in providing environmental services, including agriculture in the context of climate change.

The Financial Sector Deepening (FSD) Trust was established in early 2005 to support the development of financial markets in Kenya as a means to stimulate wealth creation and reduce poverty. It operates as an independent Trust under the supervision of professional trustees, with policy guidance from a program investment committee. Finance is provided by a number of development partners working with the Government of Kenya. Current donors include the UK’s Department for International Development (DFID) the Ministry of Trade & Industry/World Bank and Swedish SIDA.

Working in partnership with the financial services industry the goal of the Trust is to significantly expand access to services among lower income households and smaller scale enterprises. FSD’s primary focus is developing the capacity of the financial services industry, working directly with a diverse range of financial institutions (at the micro level), business service providers and support institutions (at the meso level). In doing so it compliments other initiatives – such as the Government’s reforms of the enabling environment (at the macro level) and wholesale lending programs supporting emergent micro-finance institutions (MFIs).Projects and activities of FSD are grouped in themes, namely Core Financial System, Rural Finance, Finance for growth - GrowthFin.

Opportunity International provides small business loans, savings, insurance and training to more than two million people working their way out of poverty in the developing world – many of whom are involved in the agricultural sector. By providing these loans, savings, and insurance, Opportunity International provides much needed access to finance for agricultural producers in developing countries. Clients in over 20 countries use these financial services to start or expand a business, provide for their families, create jobs for their neighbors and build a safety net for the future.

NENARACA is a voluntary regional association of credit institutions and agencies in the Near East and North Africa Region that deal directly or indirectly with agricultural credit operations and development.  NENARACA was established on 8th December 1977 in response to a growing need among the countries of the region and for fulfillment of the recommendations by the FAO 1975 World Conference on Credit for Farmers in Developing Countries for establishing Regional Credit Associations (RACAs).  NENARACA enjoys an autonomous financial and administrative status and legal entity.

 Most specifically the main objectives of NENARACA are to:

• Stimulate cooperation in the fields of planning and development of financial services for rural development. 
• Facilitate among its members systematic interchange of information and experiences. 
• Encourage studies and organize specialized symposia to discuss issues of common interest in work functions and policies.
• Coordinate and organize training programs for upgrading agricultural credit and banking skills of the staff of member institutions.

The AFDB’s Agriculture and Agro-industryInitiatives areits most relevant component for the agricultural risk management community of FARMD. Agriculture and agro-industries comprise agricultural and rural development sectors, including irrigation, livestock, natural resources and environmental management. Specifically, the Bank’s vision for the agriculture and rural development sector is to assume a leading catalytic role, within the next decade, in supporting the technological, institutional and policy changes that would trigger a lasting transformation of the rural economies of RMCs by empowering their rural populations to improve their productivity and real incomes in an equitable and environmentally sustainable manner.

The AFDB also does work in Climate Change Adaptation and Natural Resources Management with projects in Agriculture Water Management & Food Security - Upper Okavango Basinand in Reconciling the Needs of the Logging Industry with those of Forest-Dependent.

The International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) is a specialized agency of the United Nations established in 1977 as an international financial institution resulting from the World Food Conference. IFAD is dedicated to eradicating rural poverty in developing countries. Working with rural poor people, governments, donors, non-governmental organizations, among many other partners, IFAD focuses on country-specific solutions, which involve increasing rural poor peoples' access to financial services, markets, technology, land, and other natural resources. Particularly useful for the FARMD community is IFAD’s Rural Poverty Knowledge base????, which highlights topics related to agricultural risk management including climate change, desertification, food prices, food security and nutrition, rain fed agriculture, rural finance, and livestock and rangeland. IFAD also partners with the World Food Program (WFP) to meet its mission and is also involved in weather index insurance.

AgriFin aims to support financial institutions in Africa and Asia develop scalable models of agriculture finance that benefit a large number of smallholder farmers by providing capacity building grants to these institutions. AgriFin also organizes several learning activities that build the knowledge and capacity of bankers, donors, governments, and other stakeholder. It facilitates new research and contributes to wider policy development, which will help create an enabling environment for agricultural finance.

AgriFin is a global partnership program housed within the Agricuture and Rural Development Department of the World Bank. Being housed within the World Bank allows AgriFin to leverage its work with the broad range of World Bank resources. These include completed and ongoing projects in the agriculture and financial sectors, its knowledge management and research capacity, and the partnership programs it manages, such as the Consultative Group to Assist the Poor (CGAP), Financial Sector Reform and Strengthening Intiative (FIRST), and Cities Alliance. 

The overall governance of AgriFin rests with its Steering Committee, and the implementation of its activities is managed by a Program Team. The World Bank Rural Finance Adviser serves as the chairperson of the Steering Commitee and heads the Program Team. The Program Coordinator is responsible for managing program operations, with the support of two Senior Program Officers and a Knowledge Management Coordinator.

Rabobank Group is an international financial services provider operating on the basis of cooperative principles. The Rabobank Group aspires to help individuals and businesses participate fully and independently in economic activities, providing their customers with the most modern financial services required for successful participation in today’s economy. Of particular note from this Bank for FARM^D users is the Rabobank Sustainable Agriculture Guarantee Fund, which is an initiative that aims to enhance access of agricultural cooperatives (or companies buying from small producers) to local financial services. This initiative is of particular interest to the FARM^D and the AgRisk Community because it is a way to help address financial risks faced by smallholder farmers. Rabobank’s Sustainable Agriculture Guarantee Fund does so by assisting these farmers to give them greater ability to purchase, process, and trade agricultural commodities in the international market on commercial and sustainable terms.

Rabobank Group is an international financial services provider operating on the basis of cooperative principles. It offers retail banking, wholesale banking, asset management, leasing and real estate services. Focus is on all-finance services in the Netherlands and on food & agri internationally. Rabobank Group is comprised of 147 independent local Rabobanks plus Rabobank Nederland, their central organisation, and a number of subsidiaries. The group entities maintain strong mutual ties. Overall, Rabobank Group has 59,000 employees, who serve about 9.5 million clients in 48 countries.

Rabobank Sustainable Agriculture Guarantee Fund aims to enhance access of agricultural cooperatives (or companies buying from small producers) to local financial services. This to enable them to purchase, process and trade agricultural commodities in the international market on commercial and sustainable terms.