The number of Filipinos covered by cheaper microinsurance products has risen to 40 million as of September, the Insurance Commission (IC) said on Monday, Dec. 9.
At the end of 2018, the IC said 38.9 million Filipinos had microinsurance coverage.
In a statement, Insurance Commissioner Dennis B. Funa said most Filipinos turn to mutual benefit associations (MBAs) for their microinsurance needs.
He said MBAs had a market share of 62 percent, or 25 million individuals with P3.91 billion worth of insurance contracts.
Among MBAs, CARD MBA Inc. cornered bulk of both the number of insured (80 percent) and premium production (82 percent).
As of September, life insurers covered 8 million Filipinos with P1.95-billion worth of premiums, up 4 percent from P1.88 billion a year ago.
Funa, however, said “the life insurance sector posted a 27-percent decrease in terms of number of insured lives from 11 million during the third quarter of 2018 to eight million of the same period this year.”
In the first nine months of 2019, the life insurance firm with the biggest number of individuals covered by microinsurance was Pioneer Life Inc. CLIMBS Life and General Insurance Cooperative Inc. had the largest premium production during the nine-month period.
Non-life insurers sold P720 million in premiums at end-September, up 19.1 percent from P604 million a year ago.
Non-life companies also increased the number of Filipinos they covered with microinsurance policies by 74 percent to seven million from a year ago’s four million.
The top non-life insurer in terms of number of lives covered was Pioneer Insurance and Surety Corp., while premium production was led by CARD Pioneer Microinsurance Inc.
The Department of Finance (DOF) wanted microinsurance coverage among Filipinos to further climb to 50 million by 2022 by making these cheap insurance products more available to farmers and those living in disaster-prone areas.