Agroinsurance

Africa - Dry spell drives up maize prices

A dry spell in South Africa’s maize belt is threatening the overall crop, causing prices to spike.There are fears that a lack of rain in the next two weeks will diminish the size of the coming crop and result in South Africa being forced to import maize.As a result of these concerns, on Friday the price of white maize shot up by R80 to close at R2 409 a ton, the highest level since March last year.Fears around the dry weather and its impact on the maize crop have sent the spot price for white maize up by 23 percent over the past week.Maize farmers warn that if there is no rain in the next 10 days, it could result in tragic conditions in the grain farming communities and the rural economy.“This will result in high food prices for the next 12 months at least,” Jannie de Villiers, the chief executive of Grain SA, said.“The maize produced under irrigation represents almost 20 percent of the crop and is taking strain as well, with all the load shedding.“If we have a crop failure this year, we can see prices increase further by almost 30 percent,” he said.“Maize meal is the biggest staple food in South Africa, especially for the poor, and forms the basis for processed products like poultry, dairy and meat.”De Villiers said good rains in the next 10 days could change the direction the crop was going at the moment.“But currently it does not look good,” he added.Riaan Gerber, an analyst at Derived Market Investment Planning, said the market was responding to the dry spell.“The forecast for the next seven days shows that there will be dry weather and in the last two weeks there was no rain in most of the maize farming areas.”Gerber said this might push the price of maize further up.“It will even push South Africa to import maize at some stage, depending on how long it (the dry spell) lasts. If the drought persists, the maize price in the market might even go higher,” he said.Thys Grobbelaar, a Senwes analyst, said damaged fields were visible across the maize farming areas, especially in the North West and north-west Free State.He said the next 10 days were critical for the maize crop because almost 80 percent of the crop was in pollination, which was one of the critical stages for a maize plant.“The plant will need a lot of energy and for that to happen it will have to use a lot of water to produce that energy,” Grobbelaar said.He said the dry conditions would definitely affect the country’s crop yields.Although he could not give an exact estimation, he said the 2014/15 crop would “just be enough for the local market”.“If the rain in the next five days is good, I do not think that we will need to import white maize, but if it does not rain we might have to import.”The dry weather conditions will also affect the yield of soya beans.Cobus Cronje of SA Weather Services said there was a small chance of rain expected in the eastern parts of the Free State and northern parts of North West.He said the rain would spread to the western parts of the Free State by Wednesday.However, Cronje said the country was not experiencing a drought as yet, but rather below-normal rain compared with last year.AgriSA’s president Johannes Moller said South African farmers were in a similar position to last year.He said maize farmers would be able to meet the demand of the southern African market, “but should the dry conditions persist, then we will have to import”.The drought has not only affected maize farmers but sugar canegrowers as well, especially in KwaZulu-Natal.The canegrowers said last week that they were close to losing about R920 million because of the drought.Source - http://www.iol.co.za

USA - Montana Farmers Receive $698,000 Settlement From Monsanto Subsidiary

More than 30 Montanans will see premiums waived – or get cash refunds – from a $698,000 settlement reached last month between the Montana Insurance Commissioner ‘s office and a San Francisco-based company that sold Montana farmers a kind of insurance against weather events.The company is a Monsanto subsidiary called The Climate Corporation. One of the salespeople said the company’s materials were misleading, leading many farmers to believe they were getting a kind of crop insurance when they really were not.Additionally, the company was selling their insurance in Montana with unlicensed agents who did not have formal appointments with the company.Insurance Commissioner Monica Lindeen’s spokeswoman Jennifer McKee explained how Climate Corporation worked.“Climate Corp gathers data from weather sites and supplements the data from other weather sites, and then a farmer would buy a policy that would say, ‘I want to buy a policy against getting so much rainfall,” McKee said. “If that amount of rainfall was recorded from these weather sites, the farmer would either have to pay in or get money out, but it wasn’t insurance against any kind of loss.”McKee said some of the farmers have already received over $238,000 back from the company, while others will not have to pay the amount that Climate Corp said they owed, which results in the total of $698,000.Source - http://newstalkkgvo.com

Designer crops may survive future droughts brought on by climate change

Researchers announced this week that they may have figured out one of the holy grails of agricultural science – a way to reprogram plants to make them more drought-resistant.Turns out that when plants get stressed out from a lack of water they produce a hormone called abscisic acid (ABA). This natural chemical signal impedes plant growth, controls water availability and really helps plants cope with drought and heat stress. And it does this by regulating the opening and closing of small pores called stomata covering plant leaves, thereby retaining the precious water it contains in its body.“When water levels go down, ABA levels in turn rise, and that causes the pores on the leaf surface (stomata) to close and reduce water loss,” said botanist Sean Cutler of the University of California, Riverside, the lead scientist on this study.“So what we did was to take an existing agrochemical that’s already being used by farmers and reprogram plants so that they respond to the chemical as if it were the hormone. When we treat these plants with the chemical, their stomata close and water use goes down.”The new study published this week in the journal Nature shows that genetically-engineered plants can be fooled into thinking that it was ABA they were being sprayed with, when in fact it was just fungicide mimicking the naturally-occurring chemical.“Although we’ve created this back-door strategy, it relies on making a transgenic plant (i.e. GMO) to get the response. Bringing those types of crops to farmers’ fields has its own set of challenges that take time to address,” said Cutler.“What we have done is provide proof-of-principle for the idea, but it will take time, testing and regulatory approval before it could ever be deployed in the field.”However, the timing of this discovery is fortuitous. With decreasing fresh water supplies, rising global temperatures and increasing populations, there is real worry among some in the scientific community that adverse environmental conditions like major droughts like California has been suffering through will become commonplace in many farming regions.In its fourth year now, the California drought has decreased the amount of water available for crops by two-thirds. As a result, expectations are that this year about 5 per cent of viable farmland will be left dormant. The San Joaquin Valley – one of the most important farming areas in the entire United States – may end up losing a quarter of its orchards. The end affect will be felt by all of us at the grocery store, where prices will continue to rise for everything from tomatoes and lemons to almonds and wine.While the new technique only works for tomatoes, Cutler hesitates to speculate if and how useful his engineered crops would be in a world undergoing climate change, but believes the method should be viable in all crops.“ABA is a very ancient hormone and the underlying molecular machinery involved in eliciting its effects is also ancient and therefore present in all crop plants – at least as far as we can tell to date,” he said.Source - https://ca.news.yahoo.com

India - Grape farmers to get weather station

An automatic weather station is to be established in the grape research station here at a cost of Rs 12 lakh and is expected to start functioning in the next four months.According to professor and head of the grape research station, S Parthiban, the Cumbum valley in the district has a unique climate which is extremely conducive for grape cultivation. Nearly, 5,000 acres are under grape cultivation in the Cumbum valley. "In many parts of the world, the climatic conditions remain favourable only for a single crop a year, whereas here, the conditions remain favourable for at least five crops per year," and the grapes can be cultivated all through the year he said."Though five crops can be obtained, the farmers in this region take about three crops, out of which only two are usually successful. This is because one crop overlaps with the monsoon season, resulting in loss of crop due to diseases like downy mildew, powdery mildew and anthracnose disease," he said. The grape research station, which looks at ways and means to encourage the farmers, decided to set up a weather station and the vice-chancellor of the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University Dr C Ramasamy also gave the nod for the project.Experts from the Coimbatore meteorological department, who visited the station, have identified 50 cents within the 28.48-acre research station for setting up the weather station. Parthiban said that once it started functioning, the farmers will have to register themselves with them and weather alerts, including prevalence of rainfall, temperatures, humidity, wind velocity and soil temperatures will be communicated to them on a regular basis. This would help the farmers spray fungicide and initiate timely preventive measures and safeguard the crops to a large extent. Thus this would lead to plant-protection measures at lesser cost and maximise yield, he said.Parthiban added that 100 varieties of grapes were to be brought from the National Research Centre for Grapes in Pune very soon and the farmers would be introduced to the varieties of grapes that can be used for making juice, raisins and wines. Farmers would also get an opportunity to cultivate the grapes used for production of white and red wines, but they have to identify winemakers. to make a profit.In addition, the grape station is soon to get a cold-storage facility as a pilot project, which would enable the farmers to store grapes for 30 to 45 days and sell it in the offseason period and make good profit, he said.Source - http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com

World - Cereal Crops That Survive Flooding

New research has identified the mechanism used by plants in stress conditions to sense low oxygen levels - and scientists then used that knowledge and advanced breeding techniques to reduce yield loss in barley under water-logged conditions.In 2011, University of Nottingham Professor of Crop Science Michael Holdsworth and colleagues identified the mechanism used by plants in stress conditions to sense low oxygen levels and now they have discovered how this works in barley.“We now know how to breed barley cultivars more tolerant to waterlogging and flooding,” says Holdsworth.Across the world farmers are falling victim to the increasing frequency of catastrophic flooding events. Plants starved of oxygen cannot survive flooding for long periods of time. Persistent flooding and saturated arable land can wipe out crops and reduce harvests so the search for flood tolerant crops is a key target for global food security.Living on low oxygenBarley is comparatively more susceptible to waterlogging than other cereals. Average yields can be reduced by up to 50 per cent as a result of waterlogging. Resistance to this stress is an important objective of breeding efforts in high-rainfall areas of the world.Professor Holdsworth said, “Barley cultivars with the capability to withstand waterlogging have excellent growth, superior yields, retain their green appearance due to chlorophyll retention and have a more efficient metabolism even in low oxygen conditions. We now have the strategy developed for plant breeding to select for enhanced tolerance to waterlogging in barley and other crops.”Source - http://www.science20.com

India - Meagre compensation for crop loss irks farmers

Despite the reduction in cases of crop loss and cattle death, owing to wild animals, in the district, the farming community continues to suffer due to the conflict because of the measlely compensation provided by the government. Farmers complain that the compensation amount is insufficient and State government should revise it.Speaking to Deccan Herald, Palaniswamy, president of H D Kote taluk unit of Raitha Sangha, noted that H D Kote was among the worst affected regions, due to man-animal conflict in the State.“Even though works on retaining walls, elephant trenches and solar fences are under progress, animals continue to raid crops. However, the compensation amount for farmers have not been revised for more than a decade, despite an increase in the expenses on agriculture,” he said.Citing an example, he said, elephants had raided his two-acre plantain crop, four years ago, and destroyed all the crop ready for harvest. “The Forest department, based on their estimates, calculated the compensation amount to be Rs 4,000. However, the crop loss cost me more than Rs 2 lakh,” he said.Repeated demandsEven though farmer organisations have been repeatedly demanding the successive governments to revise the compensation amount, our demands have fallen on deaf ears. To make matters worse, the payment of the compensation is delayed, he said.V Karikalan, Deputy Conservator of Forests, said, the compensation amount is being distributed as per the limits set by the State government. However, there have been demands to revise the compensation amount and a proposal is before the department, he said.Cattle deathAs a precedent, the State has increased the compensation for cattle death from Rs 3,000 to Rs 5,000, about three months ago. The limit for the compensation amount that can be distributed by the DCF has also been increased from Rs 50,000 to Rs one lakh, he said.He said, of the six ranges in Mysuru forest division, maximum cases of crop loss were reported from H D Kote and Nanjangud taluks.During the year 2014-15, about 1,400 cases of crop loss and cattle death have been registered and compensation has been distributed in 950 cases, he said.He said, the cases are on a decline, as the department had spent Rs 45 lakh for compensation in 2013-14, as compared to a little over Rs 23 lakh till February 2015 this year.Sources in the Forest department acknowledge that the compensation amount for farmers had not been revised for more than a decade and half, with farmers receiving a compensation of Rs 85 per plantain sapling and Rs 650 per tonne of sugarcane.Farmers have demanded at least Rs 2,500 per tonne of sugarcane, the source added.Source - http://www.deccanherald.com

India - Keeping birds away from orchards, the ecofriendly way

Farmers cultivating fruits like grapes on ‘pandal’ are advised to erect anti-bird nets with subsidy under the National Horticulture Mission to protect the fruits from birds, squirrels, owls, etc., as the netting protects the crops from extensive damage to fruits and vegetables.Anti-bird netting is an effective method for preventing crop loss usually caused by birds that invade the vineyards in flocks. Anti-bird netting can be done manually or mechanically depending upon the need. The anti-bird nets can also be used for holding animals in an enclosure, thus preventing any pillaging by birds and in some instances for keeping wild animals out and preventing consequent damage. With regard to aviary protection, wide-meshed nets are recommended.Plastic anti-bird netting is a light weight but strong netting that will protect soft fruits and vegetables from bird attacks and browsing animals. Anti-bird netting can be used for fruit cages, protection of crops from birds, rabbits, squirrels and other similar pests, he added.The plastic bird netting is lightweight, easy to handle and simple to install over fruit cages, directly over fruit trees and on vegetable or fruit growing areas.The netting apertures allow smaller essential pollinating insects through and smaller butterflies while preventing birds. Anti-bird nets have a rectangular structure which creates a strong plastic mesh structure, making it easier to install and long lasting than the diamond mesh structured plastic bird netting.Inspecting a field with anti-bird netting protection at Krishnapuram in the district, S. Raja Mohamed, Deputy Director of Horticulture, said 50 percent subsidy at the rate of Rs. 17.50 per sq.m. limited to 5,000 sq.m. per beneficiary was being given under the NHM to the farmers, who needed anti-bird nets.As a promotional measure during the current fiscal, 1,000 sq.m. had been allotted to P. Ravichandran of Krishnapuram under this component with an allocation of Rs. 17,500.“Farmers cultivating fruits like grapes and vegetables grown on ‘pandal’ may go for anti-bird netting with the NHM subsidy. While this effort fetches sizable assistance, the yield is also increased substantially by preventing invading birds and smaller animals,” Mr. Raja Mohamed said.Source - http://www.thehindu.com

USA - Modeling nutrient loss from Midwestern crop fields

In many Midwestern crop fields, excess water laden with nitrates drains into subsurface tile pipes and then flows into surface streams and rivers in the Mississippi River watershed. When the nutrient-rich field drainage reaches the Gulf of Mexico, it supports algal blooms that lower water oxygen levels and contribute to the development of the economically and environmentally devastating "dead zone."Upriver in Iowa, Agricultural Research Service scientists Rob Malone, Tom Kaspar, and Dan Jaynes are using the Root Zone Water Quality Model (RZWQM) to assess how using winter rye cover crops in corn-soybean rotations could mitigate nitrate loads in field drainage water. RZWQM is a field-scale computer model developed by the Agricultural Systems Research Unit in Fort Collins to simulate plant growth and the movement of water, nutrients, and chemicals within and around the root zones of agricultural crops.In one study, the researchers ran the RZWQM simulation for several different planting scenarios at 41 sites across the Midwest from 1961 to 2005. Their results indicate that winter rye crops seeded in no-till corn/soybean systems when the cash crops were mature have the potential to reduce annual nitrate loss in field drainage by about 43 percent, or by 18 pounds per acre.The model results also suggested that cover cropping is more effective in reducing nitrate losses in subsurface drainage in the southern part of the region. Overall, however, Malone notes, "The model underestimates the benefit of cover crops in reducing nitrate discharge because the nitrate losses simulated by the RZWQM were about 30 percent less than field observations in Iowa."Malone and his colleagues, including Purdue University scientist Eileen Kladivko, used their findings in a larger regional simulation of nitrate losses from tile-drained fields in Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, and Ohio, located within the Mississippi River Watershed. Most of this farmland is in corn and soybean production and contributes around 46 percent of the nitrate load carried by the Mississippi River to the Gulf of Mexico.In this study, two agricultural counties were selected in each state, and the potential for winter rye cover crop adoption was estimated based on cash crop rotation and tillage systems. Results indicated that producers could introduce winter rye cover cropping on around 30 to 80 percent of the land used for corn and soybean production, and that the cover crop systems could potentially reduce nitrate loadings to the Mississippi River by approximately 20 percent."Now we need to study the effects of cover cropping on land that is not drained by subsurface tiles, as well as how cover cropping affects phosphorus loss, erosion, soil organic matter, and soil quality," Malone says. "But our results so far indicate that using cover crops such as winter rye in Midwest corn and soybean crop production could significantly reduce nitrate load runoff via subsurface tile drains. And this reduction could substantially help mitigate hypoxia and support larger national efforts to reduce nitrate loads and protect water quality in the Gulf of Mexico."Source - http://phys.org

USA - Could Crop Insurance Subsidies Be at Risk in 2015?

Farmers already concerned about the grain markets and the market price for crop insurance need to add a new worry to their lists in 2015: federal support for crop insurance.“This is probably the most challenging year for crop insurance in a very long time,” warned Mary Kay Thatcher of the American Farm Bureau Federation. Thatcher, the organization’s senior director for Congressional relations, gave her remarks Thursday at the Crop Insurance and Reinsurance Bureau’s annual meeting in Florida.What makes this year so tough? Politics and money. There’s a new set of legislators in Congress, and they want to cut costs. Lawmakers from suburban and urban districts don’t necessarily understand the rural economy and the impact of commodity markets and weather events on farmers.Compromise and bipartisanship--which has always been critical to the passage of farm bills in the past—continues to erode. “We are at the point where we have redistricted so many times that we have very few districts up for grabs anymore,” Thatcher explained. “They are either a totally Republican district or a totally Democratic district.”That’s worrisome because lawmakers in the new Congress have already started making noise about saving money by breaking apart the various pieces of the farm bill—commodity programs, subsidies for crop insurance subsidies, conservation, and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) also known as food stamps.“How in the world would we ever pass another farm bill through the House of Representatives if that happened?” asked Thatcher.She noted that separating these programs could also expose crop insurance subsidies to criticism and cuts, perhaps sooner rather than later. “Crop insurance is a big chunk of the farm bill if you remove nutrition,” warned Thatcher, who noted that premium subsidies have been immune from cuts since 1980.That could change soon as legislators look for savings wherever they can. “Farmers are going to be the ones looked at for cuts this year,” she predicted.The possibility worries her, given the current state of commodity prices and the fragile financial state of many smaller producers. "We have so much ending stocks in the world," she says. "There is no way the price [for grain] can go up. It has to go down."Source - http://www.agweb.com

India - Agriculture: Budget Wishlist

The country has a high expectation from the budget from the incumbent government. Considering agricultural sector, widespread expectations covering critical aspects are there equally there from private sector, public sector, researchers, trade participants, service providers and other stakeholders.India being one of the largest agriculture producing countries needs to keep ahead on the technology front for meeting its food requirement and matching the market pace. This requires further strengthening of the R&D and bio-technology set up in the country with more focus on commercialization of the technologies/ varieties developed through the R&D. Further, adequate linkages are required between public extension services and research institutions to facilitate effective and timely knowledge dissemination.Strengthening the quality control infrastructure across the value chain of agricultural crops may now be on priority for the Indian agricultural sector. Structured spending to improve the quality control infrastructure and implementation mechanism is required for improving the quality of food produced, processed from both organized and unorganized segments.In the previous years also there has been focus on creation of additional warehousing capacity for better handling and waste reduction at the post-harvest stage. Allowing a priority sector status to bank lending against warehouse construction under the flagship projects such as Grameen Bhandaran Yojna (GBY) and Private Entrepreneurs Guarantee (PEG) would surely trigger private investment in the warehousing sector providing additional warehousing capacities at the district and block level.Agriculture insurance has been a long debated issue. The lack of strong agricultural insurance schemes has kept agriculture unhedged from the vagrancies of nature reducing the risk taking appetite of the farmers. There is a strong budgetary support required for enabling the insurance sector to bring agriculture in the mainstream insurance thereby providing an insurance net to the farming community.Further, since agriculture is the mainstay of around 60 per cent of our population there is no income guarantee/ pension for people landless laborers/ small and marginal farmers. The budget should focus on boosting the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojna (PMJDY) for creation of adequate infrastructure and network to disseminate micro pension services through financial inclusion network of banks and micro finance institutesThe budget should also focus on the food processing sector. Specific allocation of budget needs to be done to promote the processing activities in the sector. Further boost from Ministry of Food Processing Schemes for supporting small and medium food processing infrastructure will encourage the growth of the food processing sector.Restrictions such as banning the movement of food grains from one state to another and from one district to another within the same state have hindered further growth of the sector. Though indirectly GST is expected to have a multi-faceted impact on the productivity and price realization in the sector, it is also required to examine inclusion of agriculture related taxes under the General Goods and Services Tax (GST).There is a strong need to strengthen the extension machinery of the states for providing effective support to the producers. Budgetary allocation for creating additional capacity development of trained extension officers at the field level for each state will help dissemination of information to the farmers.Source - http://www.businessworld.in

Belgium - This 3D printed tent keeps food fresh

Every year thousands of tons of vegetables and fruits get destroyed because farmers cannot afford cold storage facilities in developing countries. According to a recent study conducted by United Nations around 45% of fruits and vegetables are wasted even before reach local markets.This causes loss of labor, money and time invested in growing the crop. To prevent this, a Belgian product developer Mr. Arne Pauwels has developed an easy and affordable solution for low income farmers. He calls it WakatiOne, which is a tent that consists a evaporative coolers made from 3D printed parts and a low power solar panel.Mr. Pauwels was studying for his master’s thesis at the University of Antwerp when he found out that temperature is not the most important factor in saving fruits and other perishable vegetables. These farm products stay fresh even in the hot fields until they are harvested and his research came to a conclusion that to keep the produce fresh is to keep them well hydrated. He developed a low cost Wakati tent that works on principles of a evaporative coolers and uses a small solar panel of just three watts, Wakati creates a sterilized micro climate that doesn’t require expensive cooling systems.“For the housing of the ventilator, we turned to 3D Printing. It enabled us to continuously optimize the design in the testing phase and allowed us to produce cost-effective functional prototypes in FDM (Fused Deposition Modeling) to convince investors and potential customers. In developing countries, there’s a major need for cheap solutions to limit post-harvest losses. Thanks to 3D Printing, I was able to develop a product at a reasonable cost without compromising the sustainability,” Arne said.Wakati uses less than 1% energy a regular refrigerator and the solar panel which powers it makes it a portable device. The final version of Wakati was developed with the help of 3D printing company Materialise. Once the design of the blowers required for Wakati was ready it was printed on a stereolithography 3d printer which was using as a cast for the vacuum casting of mass production.Source - http://www.inside3dp.com

Weather-index insurance successes expand access to protection

As Nigeria continues to grow its presence in the global agriculture market, officials from the country’s Government met in London recently to discuss a desire to increase the use of index-based insurance schemes for local smallholder farmers.To back this, the meeting of officials will also be the base for the launch of a new study by the CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) and the International Center for Climate and Society (IRI) at Colombia University.The study looks at similar projects that have benefited smallholder farmers in other emerging markets, including the Agriculture and Climate Risk Enterprise (ACRE) scheme in Kenya, Rwanda and Tanzania, the Weather-Based Crop Insurance Scheme (WBCIS) in India, the Rural Resilience Initiative (R4) project in Ethiopia and others.Dr. Dan Osgood, co-author of the new study, commented; “Many countries are leading a movement to increase insurance coverage for the most vulnerable farmers,” adding that, “This shift could change the lives of millions of smallholder farmers across the globe, who face increasingly erratic weather due to a changing climate.”Nigeria’s stance as a global agriculture producer has expanded over recent years, revealing a need to protect its farmers’ livelihoods in the event of adverse weather or market shocks.As the frequency and severity of extreme droughts, flooding and storms continues to rise across the globe, the impact of losing a season’s crop can be catastrophic for farmers in less developed regions of the world.Often resulting in a rise in poverty as these smallholder farmers rely heavily on their ability to farm in order to live.In response to this, “Nigeria has made a bold commitment to support all smallholder farmers in enhancing their incomes and food security, through crop insurance beginning with 2.5 million in 2015 and is seeking evidence-based solutions to follow through on it,” explains Débísí Àràbà, Team Leader of the Environment and Climate Change Unit, Office of the Honourable Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Nigeria.Expanding on this Nigeria hopes that by 2017 it will provide agriculture insurance protection to 15 million of its smallholder farmers.The CCAFS report offers a comprehensive look at current weather-based index insurance projects, as mentioned previously in this article, while exploring key elements to ensure the success of a proposed scheme.“For an index insurance project to be successful, an index must be robustly designed so that it protects a farmer against the targeted risk and correlates well with losses,” states the report.An investment in the education of farmers is also a vital element to the success of such a scheme; this is stressed throughout the study and determined as a key reason previous projects, like ACRE, R4 and the WBCIS have been a positive establishment.Reinsurers like Munich Re and Swiss Re have backed and promoted weather-based index insurance protection schemes for some time now, and strengthening “links between insurance companies, reinsurers, scientists and the clients is not a trivial task,” notes the CCAFS.Insurers, reinsurers, insurance-linked securities (ILS) and even catastrophe bond players are increasingly looking for ways to diversify, often with a keen eye on emerging markets.As the market is currently flooded with traditional and non-traditional reinsurance capital, the deployment of some of this into new schemes, like Nigeria’s potential agriculture solution, would be hugely beneficial to all parties.Index-insurance, while currently a low-value policy market, will require reinsurance cover as it grows into a much larger pool of risk and policy values increase. As such, providing capital to back new index-insurance initiatives is attractive for both traditional reinsurers and capital markets players that are looking to expand their reach.These weather-index insurance schemes are helping to increase insurance penetration globally, and with much of the risk in these schemes directly linked to weather measurements, through parametric indices, it is easy to envisage a time when instruments used to reinsure the schemes will be parametric in nature as well.To conclude, co-author of the report and lead researcher on managing short-term climate risk for the CCAFS programme, Dr. Jim Hansen said; “The huge growth in the number of farmers who have chosen to purchase index insurance in recent years suggests that the programs we reviewed have targeted a real need, and are finding effective solutions to the challenges to providing useful insurance to smallholder farmers at a scale.”Source - http://www.artemis.bm

Spain - Artichoke production down 40%

Bad weather has caused a 40% reduction in the Bajo Llobregat's artichoke production, in an area where this vegetable is commonly cultivated. According to sources in the municipality of El Prat, excess rainfall, dry winds and temperature fluctuations have damaged the artichokes, with many plantations reaching only 60% of their usual production.Producers claim that the outer appearance of artichokes this season is not as bright as other years, although the heart has the same quality as always.The weather forecast for the coming days leaves little room for optimism, as heavy rains are expected in the area which could further damage the crops.Source - http://www.freshplaza.com

Australia - Batlow apple hail damage bill expected to be around $260k

A heavy hailstorm in Batlow on Sunday has caused around a quarter of a million dollars’ worth of damage to the pre-harvest crops in the area.The hail damage has been largely confined to just two orchards, growers say. “Around three other adjoining orchards have a small amount of damage. The total area affected is around 13 Ha and around 400 tonnes of apples,” confirms John Power, General Manager of the Batlow office. That amount represents only about 3% of the total crop, and growers expect to lose around 5% of their crop in any given year, adds Mr Power.While the apples damaged directly by hail have begun to show bruising spots immediately, in other less affected areas the spots are only just now appearing. As harvest is due to start within two weeks, now is the time when growers will assess their options.The fact spots may still be appearing makes it difficult to put a price on total damage estimates, however according to Mr Power the monetary loss is investment in the crop pre-harvest, or around $260,000. It is now for growers to decide whether or not they will employ pickers to pick the apples to sell for juicing. The fruit will only be useful for juicing if picked within the next few weeks, Mr Power adds.Source - http://www.freshplaza.com

Spain - Low temperatures drive strawberry volumes down

Huelva's strawberry sector is attending Fruit Logistica at a point in the campaign, which kicked off in late December, when low temperatures are taking a toll on production volumes, which currently stand below those of previous campaigns.The cold is causing the fruit not to ripen, leading to market shortages; as a result, prices are stable and remain at good levels. During the month of January, the average price at origin reached 2.32 Euro per kilo.Prospects for the coming days, according to Freshuelva, are for low temperatures to continue, which will likely lead to demand exceeding supply in both the domestic and the export markets.Six companies with Freshuelva at Fruit LogisticaFreshuelva, along with six of its strawberry and red fruit production companies, will again attend Fruit Logistica, in Berlin, between 4 and 6 February. These companies are Grufesa, Surexport, Plus Berries and Euroberry, which will have their own stands, and Cuna de Platero and Bonafru, which will share a stand with Extenda.They will attend the fair with the goal of strengthening their position in the European market and exploring the possibility of entering new ones, namely in Asia or the Middle East. Furthermore, Freshuelva will continue in the same line started at last year's edition of Fruit Attraction, held in October in Madrid, focusing on the promotion of the health benefits of berries.The companies will be at Hall 18, as part of Andalusia's booth, along with other companies from the region.Source - http://www.freshplaza.com