Presentation by Claudia Ringler (IFPRI) at the Closing the gender gap in farming under climate change event on 19 March 2015 in Paris. More about the event: http://ccafs.cgiar.org/closing-gender-gap

1. Microinsurance Decisions: Gendered
Evidence from Rural Bangladesh
Claudia Ringler, on behalf of
Daniel Clarke and Neha Kumar

2. Background, Methods & Hypothesis
 B: Index-based (generally on rainfall) insurance can
serve as a coping mechanism for climate extreme
events (droughts), but uptake remains low and basis
risk high
 M: Lottery choice experiment to assess risk aversion
 M: Gendered field experiments with insurance
purchase games with farmers in Manikganj and Bogra
districts in rural Bangladesh, 2 framed insurance
purchase options- 1 with the high frequency event
and 1 with low frequency event
 H: Are there gendered differences in insurance
decisions?

3.  Men were slightly more risk averse but women were
more risk averse when the lottery was framed as an
agricultural transaction; risk aversion can reduce
insurance purchase because of basis risk
 Both women and men are interested in purchasing
agricultural insurance (97% uptake in games)
 Men buy more units, but women buy more units of
the low-probability event and less units at lower
price, suggesting less financial literacy
Results

4.  Women value risk sharing in agriculture, even though
they are not primary decision-makers on agriculture in
the case study location
 Women have fewer years of schooling and lower
financial literacy and fewer insights on agricultural risks
and therefore are at a disadvantage in insurance
purchase decisions
 Most index-based insurance products have been
developed without explicit attention to gender. Yet
there is ample evidence that shocks affect men and
women differently and that there are gendered
knowledge gaps
Results

5. • Project website:
http://womenandclimate.ifpri.info/
• Project website:
http://climatechange.ifpri.info/2014/0
7/02/womens-resilience-to-climate-
change
• Toolkit
http://womenandclimate.ifpri.info/file
s/2015/02/BMZ_Toolkit_Final.pdf
• Gender and CC Policy notes
http://www.ifpri.org/sites/default/file
s/publications/gcc_pn2014.pdf
Resources