Mission
To strengthen resilience against risks for low-income vulnerable communities.
Strategy
Promoting risk reduction and risk prevention activities inlow-income communities and working with community based organisations to facilitate access to appropriate mutual microinsurance through financial education, infrastructure development and training.
Background
ICMIF has been providing development support to its members in emerging markets for almost sixty years and in 2015 established a charitable organisation called The ICMIF Foundation to take the work to the next level. The ICMIF Foundation’s 5-5-5 Mutual Microinsurance Strategy was launched in June 2016 and currently has reached over three million low-income households in total with insurance and resilience building efforts. This equates to over 16 million lives being impacted when averaging five people per household with a current funding cost per insured household of less than one USD a day.
Why should ICMIF members support The ICMIF Foundation?
- It is part of our mission – Many cooperative and mutual insurers were established to serve the underserved and this is the foundation of their success. This project provides a unique opportunity to deliver on this mission outside of their own country and support programmes that are in a similar position now to how the established companies began centuries ago.
- Investment in the future of our movement – The need for this type of support is even greater due to the pandemic and the future of cooperative and mutual insurance in these countries is at stake. This project will support the building of mutual and cooperative systems globally.
- Support our movement’s global pandemic response – Mutual and community organisations have been at the forefront of pandemic responses in the emerging markets, with people on the ground they have supported communities throughout the crisis. By coming together this not only provides more impactful support but delivers a message of solidarity from the sector to fellow mutuals and cooperatives in their time of need.
- Effective impact – with infrastructures already in place on the ground the funds will be used to scale up existing mechanisms and empower communities to access insurance that is relevant to their needs. The aim is to empower communities to take care of their own protection needs and develop sustainable business models. To date the funding cost per policy delivered under The ICMIF Foundation has been less one USD.
- Effective governance – The ICMIF Foundation is governed by ICMIF members and cooperative supporters from developed and emerging markets. As well as oversight of the running of The ICMIF Foundation they provide strategic know-how and technical expertise to projects on the ground.
- Reinforcing mutual values and principles with your stakeholders – developing mutual and cooperative insurance for low-income communities not only aligns with your own business but also raises awareness amongst your employees and members of what makes you different to other insurance providers.
- Impacting the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals – Supporting the fund will enable you to impact the SDGs, in particular the following:
- SDG 1 No poverty
- SDG 3 Good health and well-being
- SDG 4 Quality education
- SDG 5 Gender equality
- SDG 13 Climate action
- Delivering on The Co-operative Principles – Participating in this project resonates with the Co-operative Principle 6 - Cooperation Among Cooperatives and Co-operative Principle 7 - Concern for the Community.
- ICMIF was established in 1922 by five cooperative insurance companies. The core philosophy was collaboration, solidarity and that we are stronger together. A century later, our motto remains the same.
- The COVID-19 pandemic in the largest global crisis since the second world war. Hunger and poverty are increasing.
- It does not have to be like this. We have the resources and know-how to turn the situation around. Together we can build back a better world than the one we are faced with now. Our focus through the ICMIF Foundation will be on fighting rural poverty with increased gender equality.
- Cooperatives are based on values and fundamental principles that keep people, rather than profit, at the centre of their businesses. As members of ICMIF, we assume this responsibility by reinvesting in our communities, but also by supporting a world with equal opportunities for all.
November 2013: Super Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines was one of the strongest storms ever recorded to have hit land. A report released in June 2019 by the Cambridge Institute of Sustainable Leadership (CISL) entitled Mutual microinsurance and the Sustainable Development Goals: An impact assessment after Typhoon Haiyan found that households covered by life insurance delivered by a mutual microinsurer recovered better after the disaster than those without.