Rice inventory credit in Madagascar: Conditions of access and diversity of rationales around a hybrid financial and marketing service

The Malagasy rural finance network CECAM has been offering an innovative individual rice inventory credit to its members since 1993. Starting from the acknowledgement that the inventory credit is a hybrid product, which involves a mix of in kind and in cash flows and stocks, a mix of credit and savings features, and linkages with the local rice market, the paper sets out to inquire how it is accessed, used, and inserted in the strategies of different wealth categories of Cecam members. The paper is based on an analysis of quantitative and qualitative data that were collected in several phases during a 4 year impact study conducted by the authors from 2003 to 2007.