Financial inclusivity: Micro-insurance facility for people on the cards

State Life, NADRA set to ink accord for insurance cover of Rs100,000.

KARACHI:

State Life Insurance Corporation of Pakistan is in talks with the National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA) for the provision of micro-insurance facility to all citizens of Pakistan through the newly launched SMART National ID Card, according to State Life Chairman Shahid Aziz Siddiqi.

Speaking to journalists at the State Life building on Thursday, Siddiqi said an agreement was about to be struck between the two government organisations, which would guarantee each citizen carrying the SMART National ID Card the insurance cover of up to Rs100,000 in case of accidental death.

“It’s going to be a huge scheme. NADRA will pay a premium for the people under this scheme,” he said.

He added State Life won this project through fair competition, as NADRA had sought bids under the Public Procurement Regulatory Authority (PPRA) rules. “We won the bid, as ours was the lowest of all,” he said.

Besides compulsory insurance, NADRA and State Life also plan to introduce an optional insurance cover through the same SMART card. Under the optional scheme, people can insure themselves through their identity card for up to Rs1 million by paying additional premium themselves.

In addition to these proposals, Siddiqi said another proposal to provide micro-insurance cover to a large number of people through the National Identity Card for Overseas Pakistanis (NICOP) was also under consideration.



According to the planned NICOP scheme, every NICOP-carrying expatriate Pakistani will contribute $1 to provide one Pakistan-based beneficiary of the expatriate with insurance cover of up to Rs300,000.

Insurance for train passengers

Siddiqi said State Life was keen to introduce a micro-insurance scheme for passengers of Pakistan Railways (PR) in return for a negligible increase in train fares.



“We wanted to provide all PR passengers with an insurance cover on a per-ticket basis. All it would take PR to do was increase the fare by roughly five paisa,” Siddiqi said, adding it would result in State Life providing each passenger with up to Rs100,000 insurance cover.

“However, we have not received any encouraging response from Pakistan Railways,” he said.

Siddiqi noted that insurance penetration could only be increased in Pakistan through popularising micro-insurance schemes. By the end of calendar year 2011, life insurance penetration was 0.3% of gross domestic product (GDP), according to a research note of BMA Capital, an investment bank. 

Published in The Express Tribune, January 20^th, 2013.

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