Despite its promise to help low-wealth households manage climate risk, index insurance remains hampered by downside basis risk, meaning that an insured party suffers a loss, but receives no payment because the insurance index fails to register a loss. While efforts to reduce basis risk focus on...

his paper introduces a special issue exploring persistent poverty in sub-Saharan Africa. As a set, these papers break new ground in exploring the dynamics of structural poverty, integrating qualitative and quantitative methods of analysis and adopting an asset-based approach to the study of...

This article strategically surveys the past century’s literature on agricultural development. We organize the discussion around three “grand themes” that reveal the richness of agricultural development as an intellectual endeavor. First, we explore the role of agriculture in the broader...