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The Micro Insurance Agency (MIA), a subsidiary of Opportunity International, has received funding from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to provide life, health and crop insurance to 21 million poor people in 11 countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America.
“Opportunity International is a trusted partner and the Micro Insurance Agency has great leadership and experience in this nascent industry,” said Priya Jaisinghani, programme officer at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
Established in 2005, the MIA is the world’s first micro insurance provider exclusively serving poor people. Today it serves over 3 million people in 10 countries in Africa and Asia.
Its early innovations include a weather-indexed crop insurance programme piloted with the World Bank for smallholder farmers in Malawi, such as Henry Kangwelema.
Henry lost 2 children in 2004 in a famine that swept across the country. “We would be sleeping on an empty stomach this time of year,” he says.
However, thanks to crop insurance, Henry has been able to grow his farm acreage, diversify his crops and has generated significant increases in yields. He has enough money in his savings accounts to care for his eight healthy children and invest in their futures.
“The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation grant will enable us to rapidly scale up the agency so we can offer insurance to poor people who have never enjoyed the basic protections that insurance provides,” said Richard Leftley, MIA president.
The funding from the Gates Foundation will enable the MIA to significantly expand to help millions more people by 2012.
Micro Insurance Agency Uganda was established in January 2006 in Kampala with funding from the EU/ACP Microfinance Framework Programme and Opportunity International UK. It was the first time an insurance intermediary had been established to serve the poor.
The MIA has a UK office in Cheltenham. You can find out more at:
http://www.microinsuranceagency.com/
This is exciting news for the work of Opportunity International in the area of micro insurance. There is still much to be done in raising funds for loans and savings in Africa.
With the help of donors Opportunity International is on the road to achieve the global target - to mobilise $1 billion by 2012 to help lift over 100 million poor people out of poverty.
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