(Business in Cameroon) - Last February 4, in Garoua, insurance companies Activa and Axa proceeded to the payment of more than XAF23 million to cotton producers as compensation for their damaged farms.

These are the first compensations in the framework of the index-based agricultural insurance, officially launched in the country in August 2019, with the financial assistance of the IFC, a subsidiary of the World Bank Group. The partners selected for this project are the companies Axa and Activa.

According to experts, this type of insurance uses objective and transparent parameters such as failure of seedlings or the level of rainfall to assess losses and does not require costly field visits. This insurance currently allows the Confederation of Cotton Producers of Cameroon to cover 7,739 producers during the 2019-2020 season.

The IFC and its partners plan to issue more than 135,000 index-based agricultural insurance contracts by the end of 2020. These contracts will help nearly 700,000 farming households cover their farms, have access to inputs and compensate for yield losses in the event of a disaster.

BRM