Blue Marble Launches Climate Adaptation Project with support from USAID

LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM   – April  23, 2024 – Blue Marble, a leading impact insurance technology (“insurtech”) company with a mission to bring insurance to the world’s financially underserved, announces a new partnership with the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) through USAID’s Climate Finance for Development Accelerator (CFDA).  

With a grant from USAID under CFDA’s Adaptation Finance Window, Blue Marble will scale an innovative financial product in Kenya to strengthen the climate adaptation of coffee farmers connected to global supply chains. This replicable program will work with regional financial service providers to provide access to credit and insurance services, including an innovative revenue insurance product to protect the income of farmers. The Adaptation Finance Window, launched in support of the President’s Emergency Plan for Adaptation and Resilience (PREPARE), is an effort to utilize catalytic grant funding to de-risk the development and scaling of private sector-led climate adaptation approaches in frontier and emerging markets.  

Kenya is home to 560,000 smallholder coffee farmers who are largely uninsured against the effects of climate change and often experience significant income and crop losses, which also disincentivize much-needed financing and investment. Blue Marble’s project will cover coffee-growing counties across the country and protect against key climate-related risks, like droughts and floods, as well as price fluctuations. Farmers will receive automated pay-outs when predetermined parameters are met following a climate-related event. The program plans to scale to 50,000 farmers in Kenya by 2025.

“Climate adaptation is essential for protecting the lives and incomes of farmers around the world who are integral to global food supply chains. Helping them build their resilience is an economic necessity in an interconnected world”, said Jaime de Piniés, the CEO of Blue Marble. “We are proud to launch this program in collaboration with USAID to showcase how public-private partnerships can create an innovative and cost-effective safety net for coffee farmers and their families. We hope that this program will serve as a model for other regions and supply-chains around the world.”

“An unexpected climate event can be devastating to farmers and may even lead to bankruptcy. Blue Marble’s model demonstrates how coffee farmers can be protected using innovative insurance products, which serve as a catalyst for more public and private investment building resilience among local communities,” said Gillian Caldwell, USAID’s Chief Climate Officer.

In Kenya, 37 million people, almost three-quarters of the population, live in rural areas and depend heavily on agriculture, which is highly vulnerable to climate risks. Yet only 3% of the total population are protected by insurance to cope with financial losses, according to a FinAccess Household Survey. Providing financial stability for smallholder farmers helps them and their families, customers, and the wider community. Adverse climate impacts that damage the coffee harvest hurts smallholder farmers disproportionately as it can lead to a cycle of poverty and debt that is hard to escape. With the financial security that the program provides, farmers can plan for the longer term and invest in sustainable agronomy. This stability brings benefits not only for them but also for all the stakeholders and improves the supply chain’s resilience for coffee buyers.