Estimating farmers’ willingness to pay for weather index-based crop insurance uptake in West Africa: Insight from a pilot initiative in Southwestern Burkina Faso

© 2018, The Author(s). Weather index-based crop insurance is increasingly becoming important as a risk mitigation strategy that farmers may use to mitigate adverse climate shocks and natural disasters encountered during farming. While Europe, North America, and Asia account for 20.1%, 55%, and 19.5% of the total agricultural insurance premium worldwide, respectively, Africa accounts for only 0.5% of the world insurance industry. One of the key reasons advanced against the low index insurance participation rate in Africa is the failure to involve farm households at the initial conceptualization and design of pilot initiatives. Therefore, the main purpose of this paper is to design an improved participatory methodology that could help elicit information on the value placed by farm households in Southwestern Burkina Faso on a new weather index-based crop insurance management initiative. A key concept in the improved participatory methodology is that of the willingness to pay (WTP) of farm households for the scheme. Knowledge of the maximum amount that farmers are willing to pay for the scheme can help insurance policy providers and public policy makers to design and put in place measures that sustain index insurance schemes in a developing country context and improve welfare among participating farmers

Vad förväntar sig gästen?

Måltidskunskap är ett relativt nytt och outforskat området. Forskare menar att måltiden är en diffus sak att undersöka och att det krävs mer djupgående forskning kring ämnet. Den nordiska forskning som gjorts delar upp måltiden i fem aspekter. En av dessa aspekter är mötet. Mötet är en stor del i gästens helhetsupplevelse då det är där all kontakt med personalen sker. Det är därför viktigt att restauranger vet hur gästerna förväntar sig bli bemötta när de kommer, eftersom upplevelsen börjar färgas redan från den stunden gästen kommer innanför dörren. Skulle detta möte inte nå upp till gästens förväntningar är det viktigt att personalen vet hur de ska agera för att hantera situationen. Syftet med undersökningen var att belysa betydelsen av ett bra bemötande och vad gästen hade för förväntningar vid ett restaurangbesök. För att göra detta genomfördes fyra semistrukturerade intervjuer, en kvalitativ metod av tvärsnittsdesign. Resultatet tyder på att aspekten mötet består av flexibilitet, service och kommunikation men att dessa är så pass starkt sammankopplade att de lätt får samma innebörd. En måltidsupplevelse bygger på mycket mer än att maten är god. Ett bra bemötande och god service kan ta restaurangen långt. Kommunikation sker i allt vi gör och på en restaurang sker den redan innan vi sätter foten på restaurangen. Därför är det viktigt att den når fram och kan uppfattas på rätt sätt. Restaurangbesöket börjar och slutar med kommunikation

Modeling the transition towards a sustainable energy production in developing nations

The paper investigates how renewable technologies could promote the transition towards a sustainable energy production in developing nations. Based on two different developing nations in terms of economic, technological and institutional structure: South Africa and Senegal, we implemented scenarios in a bottom-up PowerPlan model in order to analyze the transition toward a sustainable electric production. Two scenarios have been considered: a business-as-usual (BAU) and a hybrid renewable energy (HRE) scenario. In the first scenario (BAU) we assume that the electricity demand is entirely satisfied by an increase of the investment in the current supply structure based on fossil-fuel energy source. Whereas in the renewable energy scenario, we assume 20% and 30% of the electricity supply being generated from renewable resources by 2020 and 2030 respectively. Focusing on wind and solar photovoltaic technologies, our results show the cost-competitiveness of renewable energy deployment in South Africa. In the case of Senegal, our results show that fossil-fuel resource remains the most competitive to generate electricity in the nation during the next coming years as long as environmental advantages of renewable resource are not considered. Our research indicates that in the case of a centralized electricity supply option, both a scale effect and a learning improvement could eventually strengthen the competitiveness of renewable technology deployment in developing nations. (c) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved

The ASOS Surgical Risk Calculator: development and validation of a tool for identifying African surgical patients at risk of severe postoperative complications

Background: The African Surgical Outcomes Study (ASOS) showed that surgical patients in Africa have a mortality twice the global average. Existing risk assessment tools are not valid for use in this population because the pattern of risk for poor outcomes differs from high-income countries. The objective of this study was to derive and validate a simple, preoperative risk stratification tool to identify African surgical patients at risk for in-hospital postoperative mortality and severe complications. Methods: ASOS was a 7-day prospective cohort study of adult patients undergoing surgery in Africa. The ASOS Surgical Risk Calculator was constructed with a multivariable logistic regression model for the outcome of in-hospital mortality and severe postoperative complications. The following preoperative risk factors were entered into the model; age, sex, smoking status, ASA physical status, preoperative chronic comorbid conditions, indication for surgery, urgency, severity, and type of surgery. Results: The model was derived from 8799 patients from 168 African hospitals. The composite outcome of severe postoperative complications and death occurred in 423/8799 (4.8%) patients. The ASOS Surgical Risk Calculator includes the following risk factors: age, ASA physical status, indication for surgery, urgency, severity, and type of surgery. The model showed good discrimination with an area under the receiver operating characteristic curve of 0.805 and good calibration with c-statistic corrected for optimism of 0.784. Conclusions: This simple preoperative risk calculator could be used to identify high-risk surgical patients in African hospitals and facilitate increased postoperative surveillance. © 2018 British Journal of Anaesthesia. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.Medical Research Council of South Africa gran