MAINSTREAMING GENDER & TARGETING WOMEN EMERGING LESSONS FOR INCLUSIVE INSURANCE November 24, 2016 Footer
Low-Income Women Remain Underserved WOMEN NEED AFFORDABLE INSURANCE THAT ADAPTS TO THEIR REALITY As women represent the majority of the world’s poor 1 , the focus should be on their characteristics, constraints and protection needs in order to create solutions and increase the uptake of insurance products by this segment. CHARACTERISTICS & CONSTRAINTS PROTECTION NEEDS • Irregular income: Most likely self-employed or in the • S he is most likely to live longer than her spouse informal economy thus she requires mechanisms that would help her • Affordability: Cannot afford traditional insurance manage her life without her spouse products • She has most likely no retirement income • Lack of products: Traditional insurance products are • She needs help with managing savings and not adapted to her needs and living conditions protecting the little she has • Financially illiterate: Limited understanding of • She has women-specific health needs insurance as a protection mechanism and lack of • She dreams about a better life for her children and trust in insurance leaving them without debt • Inaccessibility: Complicated policy language and • Her focus is on providing for her family’s basic claims processes needs • Financial constraints: Cannot cover health cost and • She requires help protecting her assets in cultures will most likely borrow to cover health emergencies where women do not have equal inheritance rights including maternity related costs • Cultural constraints: Cultural norms may restrict her mobility and interactions with male agents Source: ILO 2010
Roles of Various Stakeholders In Mainstreaming Gender In Inclusive Insurance PROMOTING GENDER SENSITIVE APPROACH TO INCLUSIVE INSURANCE DEVELOPMENT PARTNERS REGULATORS INSURERS • Facilitate collection and encourage usage of • Encourage gender-disaggregated data demand and supply-side disaggregated data • Gather and analyze disaggregated data to collection and reporting • Collaborate with insurance companies that understand the inclusive insurance women’s • Promote creation of innovative and price are promoting inclusive insurance for women market and to monitor results sensitive solutions for the benefit of low- • Work with other development partners to • Adopt a gender lens to create solutions for income women encourage peer learning and share lessons low-income women keeping in mind their • Encourage flexible distribution models learned, tools and data. characteristics and life cycle needs including the use of mobile technology to • Help build capacity of in-country partners • Leverage women agents to reach low-income further increase reach working on implementing gender-sensitive women customers who prefer face-to-face • Regulate intermediaries such as MFIs, CBOs and women’s insurance interactions and tend to be more comfortable that women typically interact with and around other women discourage informal operations • Simplify policy language and claims process • Institute complaint mechanisms that protect keeping in mind low-income women’s and are easily accessible by women financial literacy level Public-private partnerships • Adapt KYC requirements to allow more • Collaborate with inclusive insurance and strategic collaborations with flexible identification processes to promote stakeholders on financial inclusion programs stakeholders engaged on the access to insurance to help improve women’s knowledge and • Champion gender-sensitive national financial themes of gender and inclusive awareness of insurance and increase trust inclusion strategies • Build innovative partnerships to achieve insurance can play a crucial role • Promote financial literacy initiatives that are economies of scale for reaching inclusive in ensuring success of the gender-sensitive insurance women customers financial inclusion agenda.
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