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Firm finances, weather derivatives and geography

Lookup NU author(s): Professor Jane Pollard

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Abstract

This paper considers some intellectual, practical and political dimensions of collaboration between human and physical geographers exploring how firms are using relatively new financial products - weather derivatives - to displace any costs of weather-related uncertainty and risk. The paper defines weather derivatives and indicates how they differ from weather insurance products before considering the geo-political, cultural and economic context for their creation. The paper concludes by reflecting on the challenges of research collaboration across the human-physical geography divide and suggests that while such initiatives may be undermined by a range of institutional and intellectual factors, conversations between physical and human geographers remain and are likely to become increasingly pertinent. The creation of a market in weather derivatives raises a host of urgent political and regulatory questions and the confluence of natural and social knowledges, co-existing within and through the geography academy, provides a constructive and creative basis from which to engage with this new market and wider discourses of uneven economic development and climate change. © 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Publication metadata

Author(s): Pollard JS, Oldfield J, Randalls S, Thornes J

Publication type: Article

Publication status: Published

Journal: Geoforum

Year: 2008

Volume: 39

Issue: 2

Pages: 616-624

ISSN (print): 0016-7185

ISSN (electronic): 1872-9398

Publisher: Pergamon

URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2006.03.008

DOI: 10.1016/j.geoforum.2006.03.008

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