In this first detailed analysis of gaur Bos gaurus life-history traits, data were collected from a 20-month field study in South India and from captive gaur populations. Mean age of females at first parturition was 3 years; females remained fertile beyond the age of 15 years. Adult females were three times more abundant than adult males in the wild; survival of females was greater than males beyond three years of age. Life span of both sexes has not exceeded 24 years in captivity. Gaur life-history traits are similar to those of other similar-sized Bovini species.

Commodification and thinning margins of insurers have increased competition in the industry. Accessing accurate data and its meaningful analysis is becoming vital. The rise of digital technologies driven by the fourth industrial revolution (Industry 4.0) enables this but also poses new risks to insurers. The literature is evolving, and most reviews have focused on technologies or insurance value chain aspects. This systematic review of research on digital technologies in insurance discusses their benefits, enablers and inhibitors with specific reference to Industry 4.0–driven changes and identifies opportunities and imminent changes in the industry. This article discusses directions for future research. JEL Classification: M150 IT Management

Among the systems in place in different countries for the protection of the population against the long-term contingencies of old-age (or retirement), disability and death (or survivorship), defined-benefit social security pension schemes, i.e. social insurance pension schemes, by far predominate, despite the recent trend towards defined-contribution arrangements in social security reforms. Actuarial valuations of these schemes, unlike other branches of insurance, continue to be carried out almost exclusively on traditional, deterministic lines. Stochastic applications in this area, which have been restricted mainly to occasional special studies, have relied on the simulation technique. This paper develops an analytical model for the stochastic actuarial valuation of a social insurance pension scheme. Formulae are developed for the expected values, variances and covariances of and among the benefit expenditure and salary bill projections and their discounted values, allowing for stochastic variation in three key input factors, i.e., mortality, new entrant intake, and interest (net of salary escalation). Each deterministic output of the valuation is thus supplemented with a confidence interval, that is, a range with an attached probability. The treatment covers the premiums under the different possible financial systems for these schemes, which differ from the funding methods of private pensions, as well as the testing of the level of the Fund ratio when the future contributions schedule is pre-determined. Although it is based on a relatively simplified approach and refers only to retirement pensions, with full adjustment in line with salary escalation, the paper brings out the stochastic features of pension scheme projections and illustrates a comprehensive stochastic valuation. It is hoped that the paper will stimulate interest in further research, both of a theoretical and a practical nature, and lead to progressively increasing recourse to stochastic methods in social insurance pension scheme valuations.

Payments banks came into existence in India in 2015 when the Reserve Bank of India awarded licenses to eleven applicants to set up these banks specifically to further financial inclusion by providing small savings accounts and facilitating payments and remittances to the financially excluded population. As of March 2020, only six of these were operative and not very successful, both from the profitability and customer growth perspectives. This article seeks to understand the reason for payments banks not taking off as envisaged. Attributing this primarily to low adoption of payments banks by the financially excluded customer segments, this study uses a grounded theory approach based on data collected from interviews of target customer groups and of managers at some payments banks. The primary factors contributing to low adoption by the customer segments studied here, namely migrant labor and small vendors, have been identified as lack of awareness, lack of trust and lack of perceived need for their products/services. These factors arise due to inconsistencies between the business model design and the nature of the target audience. The article further discusses managerial and policy implications of these conclusions.

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