Microfinance and climate change: threats and opportunities, the case of Brazil’s largest rural MFIs, Agroamigo and Cresol

Rafael Moser, Davide Forcella and Lauro Emilio Gonzales Farias

No 16-010, Working Papers CEB from ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles

Abstract: This paper reports a cross-case study of the interface between rural microfinance and climate change in Brazil. We use a simple theoretical framework to analyse climate change opportunities and threats of Brazil’s largest rural microfinance institutions, Agroamigo and Cresol, along three main metadimensions: economic, financial and additional services. Our analysis focuses on vulnerability and adaptation to climate change and, to a lesser extent, mitigation. As proxy for climate change effects on clients and institutions, we use the recent droughts and floods affecting some of the areas of operation of these MFIs. We argue that the absence of a combination of climate change strategies in MFIs operating in weather hazard prone regions may result in greater and additional credit risks for their portfolios and a missing opportunity for these players to support their clients better respond to climate change impacts. The case studies under scrutiny corroborate our hypothesis.

Keywords: Climate Change Adaptation; Climate Change Vulnerability; Agricultural Microfinance; Rural Microfinance; Green Microfinance; Climatic Risk; Credit Risk; Brazil; Agroamigo; Cresol (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: G21 O13 Q14 Q54 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 28 p.
Date: 2016-01-26
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-agr, nep-env and nep-mfd
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Published by:

Downloads: (external link)
https://dipot.ulb.ac.be/dspace/bitstream/2013/225672/3/wp16010.pdf Œuvre complète ou partie de l'œuvre (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sol:wpaper:2013/225672

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
http://hdl.handle.ne ... lb.ac.be:2013/225672

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Working Papers CEB from ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Benoit Pauwels ().