Regional Agri-insurance programme launched to safeguard farmers from threats

Jul 27, 2024 News

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Kaieteur News – The Caribbean Community (CARICOM) in collaboration with Lynch Caribbean Brokers out of Barbados on Friday launched the Regional Economical Agri-Insurance Programme (REAP) which is set to provide agricultural insurance for farmers and fisherfolk in the Region, particularly in the face of the impact of climate change on the agriculture sector.

The launch of the programme was held at the Arthur Chung Conference Centre and was attended by President Irfaan Ali, Minister of Agriculture and Head of the CARICOM Special Ministerial Task Force on Food Production and Food Security, Zulfikar Mustapha; Minister of Agriculture, Forestry, Fisheries, Rural Transformation, Industry and Labour of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Saboto Caesar; CARICOM Assistant Secretary-General, Economic Integration, Innovation and Development, Mr. Joseph Cox and Managing Director, Lynch Caribbean Brokers, Mr. Damien Bowen among other officials.

The Regional Economical Agri-Insurance Programme (REAP) according to CARICOM, offers insurance products that provide direct payouts to cover production costs and business interruptions. REAP’s objective is to ensure financial resilience, bolster food security, and promote healthier dietary habits across the Region, which align with the key deliverables of the Caribbean Community’s Special Ministerial Task Force on Food Production and Food Security.

The programme in its initial phase presently consist of nine nations including Guyana,  Barbados, Dominica, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Lucia, and St. Vincent and the Grenadines. It is anticipated by August that four more nations will join bringing the total to 12.

CARICOM’s Assistant Secretary- General in his opening remarks said that the programme marks the introduction of a private sector driven agriculture incentives insurance initiative for the Region.

He applauded the nations and the Ministerial Task Force on Food and Nutrition Security for their pioneering participation in this initial phase and for their dedication to identifying suitable agriculture insurance schemes which is a crucial objective of the 25 by 25 initiative. Vision 25, is a commitment made by the heads of Government of CARICOM to reduce the Region’s large food import bill by 25 percent by 2025.

Noting that this programme is a significant milestone in the Region’s development, Mr. Cox shared that CARICOM member states are among the most vulnerable small island developing states whose agricultural sectors remain highly exposed to the effect of climate change.

“Changes in weather patterns, heavier rain falls and harsher dry seasons among others continue to have disastrous effects on the agricultural sector output and productivity. If the advent of hurricane Beryl has taught us anything is that we must have recovery and resilience plans in place that can respond to the natural disasters and counterbalance GDP losses and the obvious negative impact on the economical livelihood of the people of our region,” he explained.

Further, he noted that agricultural insurance plays a vital role for the Caribbean community member states by providing protection against the unpredictable and devastating impacts of climate change on agriculture as the Caribbean faces more frequent and severe weather related events. The insurance will also safeguard farmers’ livelihood and ensure food security for the people of the Region.

“The Region’s initiative aims to enhance food sovereignty and economic resilience by adapting to and mitigating against these impacts. Agricultural insurance programmes are essential to enabling farmers to invest in sustainable resilient practices mitigating climate related risks and facilitating quick recovery from natural disasters,” he further pointed out.

Speaking about the programme yesterday, Managing Director of Lynch, Mr. Bowen mentioned that the discussion in developing the programme began in 2023 at the Caribbean Week of Agriculture held in Bahamas.

He said that every territory involved has identified an insurance company that will play a role in this process.

“So there are at least three to four leading insurance companies across the Caribbean who are partnering with REAP. REAP is indeed an all inclusive model. Our purpose is to firstly protect and propel vision 25 by 25 from its major threat which is climate change,” he added.

“We are here to drive the de-risk transfer from the public sector to the private sector, we are here to propel small holder farmers and fisherfolks with scalability to even include large operators. The reality is that agri-insurance premium globally are typically out of the reach or out of the reach of your average small holder farmer and across the region especially in the OECS [Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States] their farming community is comprise of a large preponderance of small holder farmers. So the reality is our focal point initially was how we can provide this level of protection,” he further explained.

Meanwhile, President Ali lauded the initiative while noting that while it is important to proceed in this direction, it is equally important to look at the sustainability and resilience of the Region’s agriculture sector.

He shared that variables such as research and development, data and science collection that are lacking in the Region, integration of technology in agriculture, financial instrument and human resource capability are all important in building out sustainability and resilience in the sector.

“Today is a significant moment, when we started this journey just to find an insurance product that was interested in even looking at the issue was difficult. So we have now at least work that has started what I would encouraged, now that you have formalized a product, to now open the wings and to invite throughout the regions all the other brokers, all the other insurance companies who can be a part of this so that we cover the entire region and then we can even have further work on reducing the cost and making the accessibility easier,” the Head of State said.

The REAP initiative targets three key beneficiaries which are crop farmers, livestock farmers and fisherfolks and provide coverage in instances such as  drought, pest, excess rain, flood, wind and also covers fishery interruption.

In rolling out this programme, Lynch Brokers has partnered with Guy Carpenter, a leading reinsurance broker, and Raincoat, a leading insure tech firm and the inter-governmental CARICOM agencies.

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• Farmers, programme, Regional Agri-insurance, safeguard, threats

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