New Insurance Scheme to Protect Poor from Climate Risks
A new insurance scheme has been launched to help up to 4 million poor people in Africa and Asia deal with the challenges arising from climate disasters. The insurance programme – covering droughts in Kenya, Malawi, Mali, Zambia and Cambodia, and tropical cyclones in Myanmar – will mainly provide support to women farmers and their families, with plans to expand to cover floods later this year.
The scheme is expected to meet nearly 1% of the ambitious goal of G7 countries to increase access for around 400 million uninsured people in developing countries to insurance products that protect against climate risk.
The latest scheme is part of the InsuResilience Initiative, which was launched by the G7 group of nations in 2015 with Germany holding the Presidency and is aimed at providing insurance to 400 million poor and vulnerable people by 2020. The initiative received a significant boot last year during the annual United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP23) in Bonn, Germany, with the announcement of new partnerships and funding.
photo credit: Rod Waddington