One of the biggest obstacles to the expansion of microinsurance is that much of the target market is unfamiliar with formal insurance. Many potential clients don’t understand how insurance works or what benefits it can offer, and for that reason they hesitate to spend their money on it. A solution to this challenge is insurance education.

Insurance education, or consumer education in microinsurance, is any systematic effort to provide information about risk management and the role of insurance. It may include information about the features of a particular insurance product. Typically, the objectives of insurance education include developing participants’ knowledge, skills and attitudes in order to bring about a change in their risk management behavior.

Over the past several years, organizations have used innovative approaches to educate their low income clients about the need for risk management and the benefits of insurance. Much can be learned from these experiences. As new organizations enter the microinsurance sector, they will face similar challenges in educating potential clients.

We are taking stock of existing insurance education programs and identifying good practices in program design, content, delivery tools and channels, and evaluation techniques. Our objectives are twofold. First, we aim to cultivate and foster communication within the microinsurance community by making it easier for microinsurance providers and policymakers to access information about insurance education initiatives globally. We also aim to facilitate the development and improvement of new and existing consumer education programs by preparing a series of case studies that highlight lessons and challenges from experiences.