According to Nextbillion.net, LeapFrog has established the first ever fund dedicated solely to investing in microinsurance (for more posts on the subject you can go here) throughout the world. Jim Roth, the fund’s founder, said that this $137 million fund will look to invest in the wide spectrum that has become microinsurance. “Driven both by local [...]

Your daily dose of the headlines How Gandhi would write a blog comment. [If you aspire to be a good commenter - read this post!] Sanjeev Sanyal: Small-town India holds the key [Lets not shun urbanization - but focus more on the small towns] ITC’s Unique *Social* Forestry Project Bags Carbon Credits for Poor [Carbon [...]

The importance of the financial product microinsurance has been written about before on TC-I (here, here, and here). One constiuency that stands to benefit greatly from the idea of low premium safety nets are farmers, whose dependence on crop yield for income makes them very vulnerable to unforseen weather changes. In light of ongoing climate [...]

  What: 3rd Asian Conference on Microinsurance This year’s theme is ‘Microinsurance as an Attractive Growth Strategy in the Changing Economic Landscape’. This will focus on how Asia has embraced microinsurance and how various markets are using microinsurance. The program will include topics on policy reforms, key challenges, and how to support microinsurance in the current [...]

Sa-Dhan, an association of community development finance institutions in India will host a National Microfinance Conference in New Delhi on March 31, 2009. The conference is centered on the theme, ‘Microfinance Ecosystem: Equilibrium Between Growth & Effectiveness’. One of the goals for this event is for Sa-Dhan member organization to come together with academicians, practioners [...]

We have written about microinsurance before, including SKS’s Vikram Akula’s decision to develop a product for his customers. Now, Bajaj-Allianz and CARE India will be developing a product of their own. In an interesting partnership between the charity and a commercial company, this venture will aim to help individuals substantially improve livelihoods through the safety net [...]

One of the most recognizable names in Indian microfinance has decided to step down from his role as CEO. Vikram Akula, the visionary founder and leader of SKS Microfinance will step down. Mr. Akula says that this change will allow him to focus on a new initiative – microinsurance.  As MicroCapital reported earlier this year, SKS [...]

Editor’s Note: Aparna Dalal works with the Financial Access Initiative, a research consortium between New York University, Harvard, Yale, and Innovations for Poverty Action. FAI is focused on finding answers to how financial services can better meet the needs of poor households. FAI aims to provide rigorous research on the impacts of financial access and [...]

Last night I had the good fortune of sitting in on a talk given by Nancy Barry, a pioneer in the field of creating private, market-based solutions to poverty alleviation for women across the globe. Her talk was very powerful and on many points, spot on accurate in my opinion. A veteran of the World [...]

Here are two stories from Microcapital.org: Michael & Susan Dell Foundation (MSDF) and Lok Capital LLC have decided to jointly invest $1.5 million in Arohan Financial Services Ltd., a MFI located in Kolkata. Partnering with traditional MFIs like SKS India, companies like Bhartiya Samruddhi Finance Limited (Basix), Royal Sundaram Alliance Insurance and TATA AIG Life [...]