FAQ Insurance

Farm Insurance in Africa, New Ideas

Any farmer will tell you that farm insurance isn’t just a necessary expense, it is also tantamount to being a legal requirement, however in other parts of the world many farmers are effectively uninsured. A new program being developed in Kenya for drought stricken farmers hopes to change that.

Throughout Africa millions of cattle farmers are trying to seek out a living  in drought conditions but their stock faces inadequate feeding and watering, lack of vaccinations, and the wrath of the terrain which is dry and hot. Cattle mortality is high, and without farm insurance every setback  can be disastrous to the herder who will need to replace the animal from their savings.

Poverty in Africa can be eradicated if the people of Africa have access to many of the services western people take for granted such as a vibrant healthy insurance industry. Offering farm insurance to traditional tribes people would within a very short period of time help them recoup their losses and plan for a better future.

This is one of the goals of a new insurance group created by Kenya’s Equity bank, Swiss Re, the International Livestock Research Institute, and UAP, a Kenyan insurance company operation out of Nairobi. Farmers and herders in remote regions of the country will be offered farm insurance for the equivalent of one third the cost of replacing a cow for as many as 10 beasts.

However this insurance will be very different from that offered in the western nations. Normally a farmer, or any policy holder for that matter, would be required to keep inventory of their stock, and if an animal is lost they’d need to determine the worth of filing a claim against the excess or deductible charged by the insurance company. Read more »