The recent panel discussion at the 2023 World Bank Group and International Monetary Fund (IMF) Spring Meeting, " Expanding Opportunities for Women's Leadership ," shed light on the importance of empowering women entrepreneurs and leaders. The panelists, Makhtar Diop, Managing Director, IFC; Melinda French Gates, Co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation; Adji Bousso Dieng, Assistant Professor of Computer Science, Princeton University, emphasized the need to increase the number of women in leadership positions and support women-owned businesses, highlighting the crucial role played...

It all started with a dream: to increase access to credit and contribute to securing the livelihoods of the rural poor in Uganda – mainly farmers. It was unfamiliar terrain. Typically, smallholder farmers lacked a credit history, and in the case of women, lacked both a credit history and acceptable forms of collateral such as land that could be used to secure a commercial loan from a bank. Where farmers could access informal loans, the money lenders charged them exorbitant interest rates. This discouraged farmers from using these loans to buy farm inputs such as quality seed that could...

In a recent interview with Pedro Pinheiro , the coordinator of the Insurance Development Forum (IDF) Inclusive Insurance Working Group, we gained insights into a new joint initiative to scale inclusive insurance in Africa and Asia. The IDF is a public/private partnership led by the insurance industry and supported by international organizations. The IDF was first announced at the United Nations Conference of the Parties (COP21) Paris Climate summit in 2015 and was officially launched by leaders of the United Nations, the World Bank and the insurance industry in 2016. The new phase follows an...

Niger is a Sahelian, landlocked and low-income country of approximately 25 million inhabitants with an estimated GDP per capita being among the lowest in the world (US$ 591 in 2021). The country is exposed to multiple risks of fragility, conflict and violence which coupled with extreme weather conditions and natural disasters result in increased food insecurity and other challenges. Successive shocks, most recently the Covid-19 pandemic and the 2020 flooding disaster only heighten the fragility. The WBG has initiated a new technical assistance project supported jointly by GIIF and by the CDRF...

AON(1) estimates that economic losses from global natural disasters in 2022 reached $ 313 billion. Of these, insurers covered $132 billion: ranking 2022 as the fifth costliest year for insurers on record. The range of extreme weather events included floods, droughts, earthquakes, typhoons and heatwaves. Floods were the deadliest and accounted for 88.4 per cent of total deaths globally(2). As a snapshot: in Pakistan floods affected 33 million people and caused 1,739 deaths while in Bangladesh and India floods affected 7.2 million and 1.3 million people, respectively. Though on a smaller scale...

IFC recently concluded two regional insurtech mapping studies in Africa and South-East Asia. The studies provided useful insights on industry trends and investable opportunities. Insurtech is reimagining insurance for incumbent (re)insurers and customers. Key trends include data-driven process optimization, industry-agnostic product development and cloud-based platforms . Usage-based personalized products and personalized customer service platforms such as offered by Naked Insurance are industry-agnostic and provide a large value add applicable across various insurance sectors. Remote claims...

During December 5 – 8, 2022, a delegation of seven Nigerian industry experts were on a learning mission in Kenya. The study tour was organized as part of the GIIF South-South knowledge exchange effort for incumbent insurers transitioning to digital insurers. The delegates work towards transforming Nigeria’s insurance industry through the agile design, promotion and adoption of insurtech to increase the protection cover for millions of Nigerians. This was the second phase of the Neo Insurer Training Initiative (NITI). The study tour took the delegates to Safaricom, APA Insurance, ACRE Africa,...

What if there was a solution to help farmers take the guesswork out of what to plant in their fields and how to optimally nourish it based on the soil nutrient profile? This is precisely what Omishtu-Joy is providing to smallholders in Ethiopia. Omishtu-Joy, which means “Joy of the Farmer” in Afaan Oromo (a native Ethiopian dialect), has developed a soil testing device that uses artificial intelligence (AI)-powered sensors to measure different soil parameters. These soil fertility parameters include pH levels, nitrogen, potassium and phosphorous, humidity, radiation, temperature and soil...

The Philippines is highly dependent on the agribusiness sector, which employs close to one third of its workforce and takes up to 40% of the country’s land . The country and the agricultural sector are also highly vulnerable to climate risks; it is ranked among the world’s highest disaster prone countries, and it is ranked the 3rd most disaster prone country in the world, experiencing multiple typhoons a year. These natural events cause significant damage to farms and the assets of small-holder farmers. The high risk of typhoons is one of the main reasons why most banks are unwilling to...

The GIIF Program hosted a knowledge exchange session at the 2022 International Conference on Inclusive Insurance , held in Jamaica between 24-28 October 2022. The International Conference, hosted by the Munich Re Foundation , the Microinsurance Network and the Insurance Association of Jamaica , was attended by over 400 experts from 50+ countries. The objective was to offer a platform to discuss and identify ways of accelerating growth and economic viability in inclusive insurance for emerging markets. In this conference, the GIIF program hosted a session on agriculture index insurance...