The African Risk Capacity Limited (ARC Ltd), a commercial subsidiary of African Risk Capacity Group (ARC Group), has signed a partnership agreement with Pula to help provide agriculture index insurance products to the continents’ farmers.
African farmers are exposed to a range of climate risks including drought, excessive rainfall, pests and diseases, and several other perils that negatively affect their yields.
Pula specialises in meso and micro parametric insurance in agriculture and provides the levers to connect participating farmers with regional insurance companies and global reinsurance firms to underwrite such risks.
The partnership will run for an initial period of 3 years and enable Pula to work closely with ARC Group in the areas of product development, marketing, premium collection and claims disbursements among others.
Furthermore, Pula’s capacity in Area Yield Index will complement ARC Ltd’s strength in drought covers.
Commenting on the partnership, ARC Ltd CEO Lesley Ndlovu noted how a formal collaboration relationship with Pula is necessary to help protect African lives and livelihoods vulnerable to natural disasters.
“The ARC Group is currently expanding its product offerings to African Member States; and by experience, we have seen that there will always be farmers whose Governments may, by reason of fiscal constraints, not be able to take up an umbrella Sovereign disaster risk policy,” said Ndlovu.
“Working with Pula will enable us to extend coverage to Member States and these farmers in a timely and targeted manner on a mutually adaptable basis.”
“ARC Limited is the first of its kind in sovereign disaster risk insurance in Africa”, said Thomas Njeru, the Founder and Co-CEO of Pula.
“The development insurance approach of the ARC Group resonates with our mission to provide an end-to-end management of the delivery of insurance to farmers, including field operations, farmer onboarding, education and claims assessment and payouts.
“We envisage a win-win partnership that will leverage our best-in- class index insurance products and technology with ARC’s strong partnerships with Governments to provide ground- breaking products to farmers.
“In partnering with ARC we expect that we can push the boundaries of product performance to our customers and radically increase the access to insurance for millions of farmers across Africa, giving them access to the tools they need to become resilient in these challenging times”, he added.
