1) Oxfam America presented on their HARITA project in Ethiopia, which provides climate risk insurance to smallholder farmers. 2) The project aims to expand insurance to more villages with a grant from the Rockefeller Foundation to test crop insurance for irrigated farms and install more weather stations. 3) Early results found farmers benefited from insurance through increased yields and resilience. However, challenges remain around financial literacy, limited local insurers, and the need for supportive policies.

1. CLIMATE CHANGE ADAPTATION AND
AFRICAN AGRICULTURE GRANTEE CONVENING
24-25 February 2011
Project Name: HARITA (Horn of Africa Risk Transfer for
Adaptation)
Grantee : OXFAM AMERICA
Presenter : SOPHIA BELAY, MICRO-INSURANCE
COORDINATOR
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2. Brief Background of the Institution
• Vision
Oxfam America envisions a just world without poverty.
Mission
Oxfam America is committed to creating lasting solutions to poverty,
hunger, and social injustice.
Values
Oxfam America strives to be:
Trustworthy, Accountable, Collaborative, Creative, Professional and
Results-driven
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3. Your other projects/programs on climate change
adaptation
• Focus on Policy Advocacy and Awareness Raising
– Creation of Climate Change Forum
• Workshops and Learning Events to Various Stakeholders
– The Ethiopian Parliament
– Ethiopian Climate Change Negotiators
– Women Constituencies
• Mass Mobilization (Climate Hearings to demand justice in
International negotiations)
• Research
– The rain doesn’t come on time anymore: Climate Variability,
Vulnerability and Poverty in Ethiopia
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4. Your other projects/programs on climate change adaptation
• Research Cont’d
– The Role of Small-scale Women Food Producers in a Climate
Smart Agricultural Development: A Case Study
– Governance of Climate Finance
– Understanding Community Based Coping Mechanisms and their
Interaction with extra local interventions
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5. Objectives of the Rockefeller Foundation Grant
1.1To increase the effectiveness, accountability, and scalability of the
HARITA model piloted in Adi-Ha by reaching 4 more villages in
Tigray
1.2 Install new automatic stations and plastic rain gauges which would
serve for verifying the satellite data
1.3 To test the feasibility of crop insurance for small scale farmers
engaged in irrigated agriculture.
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6. Key Activities Related to the Grant
1.1 Reach 4 more villages
• Pilot Expansion planning with partners
• Community Vulnerability and Capacity Assesements
• Financial Package Preparation
• Education and Outreach, Consumer Protection
• HARITA farmers enrollment
• Risk Reduction Implementation
• Evaluation and Learning
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7. Key Activities
1.2 Install new automatic weather stations and plastic rain
gauges
• 4 Weather stations and 96 plastic rain gauges imported with
technical support of IRI in the selection process
• Site selection for the weather stations was done with the technical
support of NMA
• Training given to NMA by IRI on how to operate the stations
• Training given to farmers by NMA on how to use the rain gauges
• Plastic rain gauges distributed to representative farmers - 24
farmers per village
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8. 1.3 Key Activities – Test the feasibility of crop insurance for
irrigated small scale farms
• TOR prepared and Call for Proposals made
• Monitor Progress and facilitate
• Review draft report
• Results shared internally
• Report proved that there is a demand for insurance among small
scale irrigated farms, both for their infrastructure and their crops
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9. HARITA - Implementation Approach
)
Labor
Cash / Grain
Donations
Insurance - Labor
for-Work Ins. Voucher Poorest
Donations Program
Rockefeller Households
Foundation
Premiums
Local Insurer
Premiums Microfinance Premiums
(Nyala) Poor
& Payouts Institution Payouts
Households
Global Reinsurer (DECSI) Credit
(Swiss Re)
Repmnts
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10. PARTNERS
 Global
 The Rockefeller Foundation
 IRI/Columbia University
 Swiss Re-insurance Company
 National
 Project owners
 Nyala Insurance Company
 Ethiopian National Metrological Agency
 Mekelle University
 Institute for Sustainable Development
 REST- A Local NGO
 DECSI Microfinance Institution
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11. Highlight on the Progress to date
• HARITA was expanded to five villages and 1308 households
• More crops i.e, barley, wheat were insured, in addition to teff.
• Two policy options were availed to farmers, the dry and the very dry
contracts.
• Farmers were engaged in Risk Reduction Activities designed to
increase their resilience to climate change- designed in collaboration
with Mekelle University, the Tigray Agricultural Research Institute
and the Institute for Sustainable Development.
• Approximately 40% of insured households were female headed
households.
• Growing interest in micro-insurance both as a development model
by donors and practitioners and as a business model by the
insurance industry
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12. Early Findings (optional)
• Interviews with farmers indicated that they are benefitting from the
existence of the insurance as they are now getting increased yields
due to more productive inputs like better yield seeds.
• Evaluation, which would be finalized by end of May 2011, is
underway.
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13. Key Challenges
• Low level of financial Literacy of farmers
• Limited number local insurers interested in crop insurance
• Low capacity on the supply side i.e, insurance industry
• Limited number of weather stations owned by NMA
• Engaging financial institutions e.g MFIs
• No clear policy on agricultural insurance
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14. Lessons Learnt
• The vulnerability of farmers to fall into a poverty trap reduced in
those villages reached by HARITA
• Importance of partnerships i.e, Private Sector, NMA, IRI, Mekelle
University
• Effectiveness of a demand driven insurance policy
• Importance of capacity building of both the demand and supply side
to promote sustainability
• More farmers demand coverage
• Importance of the holistic approach in order to make meaningful and
sustainable changes.
• Importance of Community Risk Pool fund as an additional risk
management layer for small weather shocks
• The importance of the conducive policy environment to scale up
HARITA i.e PSNP and Growth and Transformation Plan
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15. Emerging Opportunities for Collaboration
• Partnership with Farmers Cooperatives and Unions being developed
• Micro-insurance being considered as a climate change adaptation
approach by more donors, Gov’t Agencies, Farmers Cooperative
Unions and increasingly by farmers
• HARITA’s success attracted the interest of WFP
• A joint 5 year rural resilience program modeled on HARITA in
Partnership with WFP
• WFP’s experience in managing safety nets with Gov’ts is an asset
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16. Towards Climate Resilience in Agriculture
PSNP HARITA R4
WFP + International Donors + Oxfam America + Swiss RE + WFP + OA
Govt of Ethiopia Communities + REST+IRI + Nyala+ Mekel + Communities + Partners
e U + DECSI
Risk Risk
Risk
REDUCTION REDUCTION
REDUCTION
Risk Risk Risk Risk
TRANSFER TAKING TRANSFER TAKING
Risk
RESERVES
DRR thru Cash / Food-For-Work DRR thru Insurance-For-Work DRR thru Insurance-For-Work
+ +
Credit facilities / opportunities Credit facilities / opportunities
+
Individual & Community Savings
Food For Work HARITA Food Security through
(Safety Nets) Climate Resilience
2011
2005 15

17. Next steps
• Expand HARITA to 50 villages in Tigray to prove scale
• Expand to one more region as risk diversification strategy
• Insure maize and Sorghum in addition to teff, barely and wheat
• Organize series of trainings to the industry to enhance capacity
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18. Thank You!
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