The Landscape of Microinsurance in the World's 100 Poorest Countries

This report provides a description of how microinsurance works, and presents a landscape survey (a detailed quantitative overview) of microinsurance in the worlds hundred poorest countries. The paper states that:

• Microinsurance has to be well-administered, cost-efficient and delivered on a large scale if it is to benefit the poor and those who provide microinsurance;
• The microinsurance supply chain is made up of five components: the reinsurers, the insurer, the delivery channel, the policy-holder and ‘covered lives.

A team of microinsurance experts, who identified and assessed micro-insurers, products, delivery channels, regulations, social security schemes and donor interventions, gathered the information for the report from primary and secondary research. The research team found:

• Significant presence of health microinsurance, especially in West and Central Africa, with a large number of programs, small membership and limited growth potential;
• Dramatic effect of insurance regulation introduced in India, which has pushed microinsurance out of the rural areas and towards the poor;
• A noticeable lack of microinsurance in North Africa and the Middle East;
• Non-existent broker activity in microinsurance and weak delivery channels that hinder microinsurance activity.

The report concludes that microinsurance for the worlds poor is growing fast, with most growth coming from the private sector, and micro-insurers are positive about the future, predicting 100% growth over the next five years.