We partnered with Frontier Markets to design a crop insurance for women smallholder farmers in India
Case studies
Context
Frontier Markets is a rural social commerce platform in India focused on providing local access to high-quality, climate-friendly, and gender-inclusive products and services.
Smallholder women farmers represent 57% of India’s agricultural labor, yet existing insurance products remain unaffordable, inaccessible and poorly suited to their needs, especially in remote areas.
The objective is to structure a drought insurance product tailored to the risks and vulnerabilities of women smallholder farmers.
Action
Supported by NDF TA funding, Global Parametrics (GP) partnered with Frontier Markets to develop a parametric insurance product to protect women smallholder farmers against drought risk. GP’s activities include:
Designing a survey to collect relevant data on exposure and loss history
Structuring a drought insurance product with its Water Balance Index
Providing reinsurance capacity via the Natural Disaster Fund
Providing index monitoring and policy settlement services, in collaboration with the local insurer
Frontier Markets is leveraging its digital platform and rural network to facilitate data collection and insurance policy distribution. The policy will be underwritten by Agriculture Insurance Company of India, with premium subsidies from Humanity Insured.
Impact
- 5,000
- women smallholder farmers protected in year one pilot
- 24,000
- individuals benefited from year one pilot
- 50
- rural villages covered in Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh
- 1 million
- target women smallholder farmer policyholders by 2030
Smallholder women farmers being trained on parametric insurance, co-designed by Global Parametrics and delivered using the ‘training the trainers’ approach