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There is a growing consensus among the development community that the insurance can provide an effective risk management tool for climatic and non-climatic disasters. Several insurance initiatives have been implemented at grassroots level for reducing the vulnerability of communities to disasters in most of the countries in Asia and the Pacific over the years. Despite these grassroots efforts, insurance penetration is poor in the developing Asia-Pacific compared to many developed countries in the region due to several barriers that this sector is facing. Keeping this in mind, this chapter assesses the benefits accrued through community level insurance experiences in some of the developing countries. It evaluates barriers limiting the penetration of crop insurance and identifies interventions for greater insurance penetration leading to climate change adaptation (CCA) and disaster risk reduction (DRR). It is evident from the chapter that countries are at different stages of developing agriculture insurance programmes and institutional mechanisms, with the Philippines at the fore front followed by Vietnam and Malaysia. Growing disaster losses and related burden on government have been the clear driver of insurance in the study countries.

Cost appeared to be the single most important determinant of buying insurance. The majority of respondents, whether currently participating in insurance or not, prefer insurance to be fully subsidized. The insurance payments were mostly either timely or timely enough to recover, and most farmers were unsure of damage assessment procedures adopted by the insurance companies and were overwhelmed by the claim procedures. In areas where insurance is present, insurance helped farmers to recover but the respondents felt that the insurance did not completely compensate their loss. Insurance did not completely stop most farmers borrowing from a formal lending institution or from family and friends after a disaster.