Southasiadisasters.net, Issue No. 218 | March 2025

India leads in promoting parametric insurance solutions for all, including those affected citizens in South Asia. And this is possible.

As climate change intensifies the frequency and severity of disasters, traditional insurance models are often too slow or insufficient to meet the urgent needs of affected populations. This latest issue of Southasiadisasters.net—Parametric Insurance Solutions for All—examines how parametric insurance is emerging as a powerful, scalable solution to address these growing risks.

Parametric insurance offers pre-agreed payouts based on specific triggers such as temperature thresholds or rainfall levels, ensuring fast, transparent, and efficient support to those hit hardest—vulnerable communities, informal workers, smallholder farmers, and microenterprises. By bypassing the lengthy claims processes of conventional insurance, it allows for immediate relief, enabling communities to bounce back faster and with greater resilience.

This issue brings together leading voices from across sectors—government, civil society, international organizations, and the private sector—to share practical insights, policy recommendations, and lived experiences of designing and deploying parametric solutions. From SEWA’s pioneering work with informal women workers to InRisk Labs’ innovations in heat-risk financing, the articles chart a compelling roadmap for inclusive climate adaptation.

With a strong emphasis on collaboration and innovation, the publication calls for greater investment, data infrastructure, and policy alignment to mainstream parametric insurance as a critical pillar of disaster risk reduction and climate resilience in South Asia and beyond.

Certainly, this will take some, meanwhile each state in India can have its own pilot that directly protects the poor, women, workers, migrants, tribals, and all minorities with parametric insurance solutions.

In This Issue:

1. Universal Extreme Heat Protection: Will India’s Insurance Sector Lead?
    Mihir R. Bhatt, All India Disaster Mitigation Institute (AIDMI), India
2. Developing and Upscaling Innovative Parametric Insurance Solutions
    Shishir Agarwal, Senior Consultant Disaster Risk Financing and Risk Transfer, National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA), India
3. The Journey and Lessons of AIDMI’s Risk Transfer and Insurance
    Vishal Pathak, All India Disaster Mitigation Institute (AIDMI), India
4. Heat Adaptation Finance for Women – Applying Insurance to Solve a Disproportionate Burden
    Kathy Baughman McLeod, Mary McBryde, and Visala Annamalai, Climate Resilience for All, Washington DC & Cape Town
5. UNDP’s Insurance and Risk Finance Facility (IRFF): Parametric Insurance Solutions
    Sumanta Kumar Sahoo, National Programme Coordinator, UNDP India
6. Parametric Insurance and Extreme Heat: SEWA’s Experience
    Dr. Sahil Hebbar, SEWA, India
7. InRisk Labs: Pioneering Parametric Insurance for Extreme Heat in India
    Malay Kumar Poddar, MD, InRisk Labs, India
8. Key Points for Action to Make Parametric Insurance for Extreme Heat a Reality
    Anshul Khurana, Cofounder, Entitled Solutions, India
9. Parametric Insurance – Building Financial Resilience for Rural India
    Samdarshi Vikram Singh, Vice President, Government Business Group, Future Generali India Insurance Company Ltd., India
10. The Health Impact of Climate Change on Gig Workers in Indian Cities: Exploring Parametric-plus Insurance as a Climate Adaptation Approach
     Suma Pathy, Population Services International (PSI), India
11. Leveraging Parametric Insurance for Addressing Extreme Heat Risk
     AIDMI Team, India
12. Locally Led Actions to Combat the Impacts of Heatwaves
     Mihir R. Bhatt and Vishal Pathak, AIDMI, India