Jeffrey Sachs, celebrity economist, has a revolutionary idea.

And like most revolutionary ideas, it's quite simple (conceptually, at least). It's so simple that your first reaction is to slap your forehead and say, "Of course!"

The proposition: spur economic development in Africa in the same exact way we spur it here: manage risk through insurance.

Maybe this isn't orignally Sachs' idea, but as a big-brained and well-traveled guy who's frequently seen with the likes of President Clinton and Sir Bono, he's got the street cred to actually get African farmers in insurance policies.

Let me guess what you're thinking: much of the African continent needs clean water, peace, cheap antiretrovirals and a whole host of important things. Insurance, you say, is pretty far down that list.

Yes, it is.

However, when it comes to economic development, managing risk essential. But as Sachs' recent article in Scientific American magazine notes, "traditional crop insurance is almost non-existent in Africa." So any farming operation that has even a modicum of ambition is fraught with risk--and likely doesn't even get off the ground because of the loss potential.

The reason for the lack of insurance, Sachs says, is a lack of innovation. Insurance as we know it wouldn't really work in Africa. Sachs explains why:

But in impoverished Africa, multiple problems would routinely be fatal to [a typical crop policy]: the absence of an actuarial risk model; adverse selection (farmers with especially risky conditions would seek the contracts); moral hazard (farmers covered by insurance might fail to take other protective measures) and enormously high costs of marketing, signing and assessing losses relative to the value of the policy.

But that doesn't mean insurance won't work in Africa. Insurance isn't one size fits all, so the challenge for policy makers and insurers is to create a risk model that reflects the realities of the under-developed world. Sachs' article describes one such model, but instead of explaining it here, I'll let you read about it over at Scientific American.com.