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Understanding the Concept of Micro Insurance

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Fola Daniel, commissioner for Insurance
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The importance of micro insurance in bailing Nigerian out of its low insurance esteem cannot be over estimated. In recent times, the practice has been receiving tremendous support among operators. With the integration of insurance businesses in Africa, especially as the country makes in-road into African countries, experts have opined that the time to embrace micro insurance is now.
According to Dr. Mike Ikupolati, president of West Africa insurance Association, insurance over the world,  has been found to be a major player in the socio-economic development of societies and more recently in strive towards poverty eradication in our societies.  Insurance in West Africa cannot therefore be an exemption.  Given its rightful place in this poverty alleviation crusade, Insurance can help tremendously in uprooting completely the causes and effects of poverty in our societies.
To provide protection against risks, the poor have in the past developed informal and non-insurance mechanisms such as diversifying income sources, building assets by saving money, stocking food and investing in housing and healthcare, strengthening social networks, participating in reciprocal borrowing and lending systems, welfare associations and other informal group-based insurance systems. Some of them are enrolling in formal insurance or pension schemes or other formal social security systems.  It also involves managing money well by controlling consumption and maintaining access to multiple sources of credit selling assets, exchanging gifts, cash transfer, diversifying crops etc,.
In West Africa, people had tried “OSUSU” as a means of providing for unforeseen contingencies.  Unfortunately these have proved inadequate and have instead retarded economic growth and social mobility.  Many elderly people live in poverty due to limited access to pension plans and saving facilities.  These are the specialties of micro-insurance products today.  Since loan facilities are increasingly impossible to access by the poor, the micro-insurance principles take cognizance of the situation of the poor and hence created products and services that are at the reach of the poor.
With this privileged information at the back of our minds, let us attempt to have a better understanding of micro insurance.
Micro insurance is a financial arrangement to protect low-income people against specific perils in exchange for regular premium payments proportionate to the likelihood and cost of the risk involved (Craig Churchill, 2006).  This definition Churchill adds does not refer to the size of the risk-carrier; some are small and even informal while others may be very large companies.
The scope of risk, the risk themselves are by no means ‘micro’ to the households that experience them.
The delivery channel can be done through variety of different channels including small community-based schemes, credit chains or other types of micro finance institutions, but also by enormous multinational insurance companies.
Micro insurance is synonymous to community-based financing arrangements (Peter et al, 2002), including community health funds, mutual health organization, rural health insurance, revolving drugs funds and community involvement in user-free management.  Most community financing schemes have evolved in the context of severe economic constraints, political instability and lack of good governance.  The common future within all is the active involvement of the community in revenue collection, pooling resource allocation and frequent service provision.
Insurance functions on the concept of risk pooling and likewise regardless of its small unit size and its activities at the level of single community, so does micro insurance.  Micro insurance links multiple small units into layer structure, creating networks that enhance both insurance functions through broad risk pools and support structures for improved governance i.e. training data bank, research facilities, access to reinsurance, etc.  This mechanism is concerned as an autonomous enterprise, independent of permanent external financial lifelines and its main objective is to pool both risks and resources of whole groups for the purpose of providing financial protection to all members against the financial consequences of mutually determined risks.
Transactions are low-cost and reflect members’ willingness to pay.
Clients are essentially low-net-worth but not necessarily uniformly low and
communities are involved in the important phases of the process such as package, design and rationing of benefits.
The essential role of the network of micro insurance units is over and above what each can do when operating as a stand-alone entity.
And finally that cooperation among stakeholders is the key to successful provision of micro insurance to the poor, who constitute the teaming population in West African; mainly illiterates and are of low-income group who could hardly afford the prices of the conventional insurance products, currently sold by commercial insurers.
Small benefits amount are clearly defined and simple rules and their restrictions are
easily accessible, encompassing claims documents requirements and fast payment of benefits.
Also of value is the need for specially adapted client education, affordable premiums payable in small amounts as exclusive as possible.
To thread successfully in this unpopular road, the insurance practitioners must be facing or are ready to face some obvious challenges. The key principles of innovation for this market with enormous potentials are;
conventional wisdom in delivery of products and services has to be challenged even as
significant investment in customer education is imperative.
Volume is also a basis for returns on investment especially as technology has to be combined with the existing infrastructure.
It is paramount that for micro insurance to be successful,government huge investment in guaranteeing confidence in the sector by the private sector is paramount.
The challenges of micro insurance in West Africa are many.  It is vital to know that our local conditions are unfavourable premium income is low, administrative costs are relatively high and infrastructure for insurance support is lacking.  These explain why the commercial insurers in West Africa have not taken more interest in this market.  Reaching the poor people, many of whom are illiterates and making a living in the informal economy is difficult.  And benefit of insurance is often misinterpreted since most of them do not understand why the premiums are not refunded if no claim is made.
These challenges are compounded by the following;
No mechanism to systematically reach the informal workers and the workers themselves are largely unorganized in most cases, especially in cases where there is no employer contribution.
The poor may not be able to afford the full cost of running a conventional insurance due to insufficient government resources to cover recurring expenses and
inadequate infrastructure to provide appropriate services.
Micro-insurance as social security therefore,
fills the gap to provide coverage to the excluded and responds to an urgent need in the absence of formal social security.
Ikupolati had stressed that it also creates delivery mechanisms to extend government programmes to the informal economy while striving to integrate the informal and the formal.
The institutions or set of institutions implementing micro-insurance are commonly referred to as a micro insurance scheme.
There are government policies and programmes to reduce poverty and vulnerability by diminishing people’s exposure to risk and enhancing their capacity to protect themselves but in West Africa, these programmes are not particularly effective.The main obstacles being no mechanisms to systematically reach informal worker as well as the absence of employer contributions as earlier stated.
Micro-insurance is not a new invention.  The industrial life assurance sold at factory gates in American cities in the early 1900s made the then Metropolitan life insurance company, the largest industrial life assurance as the forerunner of what today is known as commercial micro-insurance.
It was simply a response to a market demand managed in a manner that made the products appropriate for the market.  The delivery channels, agents at each factory gates, were specific to this market.  The premiums reflected the particular risks of the factory worker market.  Coverage responded to the workers specific needs, premium collection on pay day as the workers exited the factories were efficient.  In general, industrial life assurance was then a response to a market that provided access to quality insurance products for low income workers and access to a large market for the insurers.
Today the need to meet the demand of the poor is becoming increasingly significant as majority of the population in West Africa especially live in the rural areas where access to micro-finance has been limited and hence insurance provisions are at low ebbs.  Consequently, the provision of insurance products to micro-finance clients is becoming increasingly common and popular.  Much has been learnt over the past decade about how to design products to better meet the needs of the poor.
The provision of any financial services to the poor must start with an understanding of client demand.
What are the financial needs of the poor?
In developing economics and particularly in the rural areas, many activities that would be classified in the developed world as financial are not monetized, that is, money is not used to carry them out.  Almost by definition, poor people have very little money.  But circumstances often arise in their lives in which they need money or the things money can buy.
In Stuart Rutherford’s recent book The Poor and Their Money, he cites several types of needs
Lifecycle Needs:  such as weddings, funerals, childbirth, education, home building, widowhood, old age.
Personal emergencies such as sickness, injury, unemployment, theft, harassment or death as well as disaster such as fires, floods, cyclones and man-made events like war or bulldozing of dwellings.
The work of Rutherfod, Wright and others had caused practitioners to reconsider a key aspect of the micro-credit paradigm: that poor people get out of poverty by borrowing, building micro-enterprises and increasing their income.  The new paradigm places more attention on the efforts of poor people to reduce their much vulnerability by keeping more of what they earn and building up their assets.
While they need loans, they may find if as useful to borrow for consumption as for micro-enterprises.
A safe, flexible place to save money and withdraw it when needed is also essential for managing household and family risk.
Poor people over the years have found creative and often collaborative ways to meet these needs, primarily through creating and exchanging different forms of non-cash value.  Hence, the idea of micro insurance cannot be totally strange to them.
Therefore, micro insurance can be offered in many areas among them; health risks, injury or death as well as property risks such as agriculture risks such as low yield, theft travel risks etc,.  Individuals in the low-income bracket have needs and preferences that may vary.  Micro insurance product design must therefore reflect this heterogeneity and premium payments should also be tailored to the customers’ cash flow position.

 


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New Tax Law Empowers NRS to Fine Offenders up to N10m

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The newly enacted Nigeria Tax Administration Act, 2025, has empowered the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), renamed Nigeria Revenue Service (NRS), to impose fines for individuals and companies for failing to register, file returns, use tax technology, or disclose basic information like a change of business address.

New Tax Law Empowers NRS to Fine Offenders up to N10m

The Act is among the tax laws signed by President Bola Tinubu on June 26.

The tax administration law is expected to take effect from January 1, 2026, under a renamed agency — the Nigeria Revenue Service (NRS), currently known as the FIRS.

The Act, which is an updated version of previous fragmented tax enforcement provisions, outlines a comprehensive list of offences and corresponding penalties, with fines ranging from N10,000 to N10 million, as well as prison terms of up to 10 years for serious breaches.

Under the general offences and penalties section of the law, a taxable person who fails to register with the relevant tax authority is liable to a N50,000 fine in the first month and N25,000 for each subsequent month of default.

The Act stressed that companies that award contracts to unregistered vendors will face a N5 million penalty.

The law also imposes a N100,000 fine for failure to file tax returns, plus N50,000 monthly for as long as the failure continues.

“A taxable person who fails or refuses to file returns or knowingly files incomplete or inaccurate returns to the relevant tax authority in accordance with the provisions of this Act, shall be liable to pay an administrative penalty of (a) 100,000 in the first month in which the failure occurs; and (b) N50,000 for each subsequent month in which the failure continues,” the Act reads.

“A taxable person who Failure to books (a) fails to keep accounts, books and records of business transactions and income, to allow for the correct ascertainment of tax and filing of returns to the relevant tax authority; or (b) upon request by the relevant tax authority, fails to provide any record or book prescribed in this Act shall be liable to pay an administrative penalty of- (i) in the case of a person other than a company, N10,000, and (ii) in the case of a company, N50,000.”

Also, the law states that failure to notify the tax authority of a change of address within 30 days of such change, giving a wrong address, or failing to comply with the requirement for notification of permanent cessation of trade or business under the relevant tax laws shall be liable to an administrative penalty.

“A taxable person who fails to notify the relevant tax authority – Failure to notify change of address (a) N100,000 for the first month in which the failure occurs; and (b) 45,000 for each subsequent month failure persists,” the law reads.

In a bid to modernise tax compliance, the Act makes it compulsory for businesses to allow the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) to deploy fiscalisation technology or face a N1 million fine for the first day of refusal and N10,000 for each day after.

Any business that fails to process sales through the fiscalisation system will also be fined N200,000, pay 100 percent of the tax due, and accrue interest at the prevailing Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) monetary policy rate.

The Act is especially punitive toward those who fail to deduct or remit taxes.

“A person that deducts, collects, or withholds any tax under this Act, and fails to remit the amount deducted, collected, or withheld by the 21st day of the month immediately succeeding the month in which the amount was deducted, collected, or withheld, is liable to pay,” it added.

“Failure to remit tax deducted source or self-account (a) the amount deducted, collected or withheld but not remitted; (b) an administrative penalty of 10% per annum of the tax deducted, collected or withheld but not remitted; and (c) interest at the prevailing Central Bank of Nigeria monetary policy rate. “A person convicted of any of the offences under this section shall be liable to a term of imprisonment not exceeding three years, or a fine of not less than the principal amount due plus a penalty of not more than 50% of the sum, or both.

“A person who (a) fails to comply with the requirements of a notice served under this Act or any other tax law; (b) fails to attend or provide answers to a notice, summons or process served under this Act or any other tax law; or (c) having attended, fails to answer any question lawfully put to him, is liable to an administrative penalty of N100,000 in the first day of default and N10,000 for every subsequent day where the default.”


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Taskforce Arrests Six for over Fake Lottery Scam

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Lagos State Environmental and Special Offences Enforcement Unit (Taskforce) has apprehended six suspects allegedly involved in a fraudulent lottery scheme that targeted unsuspecting residents at Iyana-Ipaja.

Taskforce Arrests Six for over Fake Lottery Scam

Those arrested include Amaike Nelson, Kenneth Opuana, Oguntade Olusegun, Ogologo Obi, Goodluck Abel, and Oluwafunmilayo Adebimpe. The syndicate was tracked down following intelligence reports about their activities.

According to the taskforce, the suspects lured a 19-year-old student, identified as Rukayat Kamilu, into a manipulated street game. During the encounter, the group reportedly coerced her into surrendering her mobile phone and personal belongings.

The victim said one of the suspects, later identified as Oguntade Olusegun, posed as a confused passer-by seeking help to pick a “winning number.” After she got involved, her phone was seized, and she was allegedly pressured to pay N100,000 to retrieve it.

Acting on a tip-off, operatives led by CSP Adetayo Akerele, chairman, stormed the area and arrested the suspects. Several empty Android phone boxes, allegedly used as props in the scam, were recovered during the operation.

Condemning the criminal act, Akerele assured residents that the agency is intensifying its crackdown on street scams across the state.

“Our responsibility is to safeguard the lives and property of Lagosians. We will leave no room for such fraudulent activities to thrive,” he stated.

The suspects were subsequently arraigned before a Magistrates’ Court on charges bordering on gambling, extortion, theft, and conspiracy.

They all pleaded guilty. The court ordered that they remain in custody pending further hearing, scheduled for August 7, 2025.


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FG Plans N50m STEEM Grant to Support Student Innovation in August

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In a giant stride to support innovation, entrepreneurship and economic transformation, the Federal Government is set to unveil a N50 million grant for Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics and Medical Sciences (STEEM) students in Nigeria’s tertiary institutions.

The project, which is referred to as the Student Venture Capital Grant (S-VCG), is a pioneering initiative designed to empower the students towards building the next generation of scalable, job-creating ventures.

According to a statement by the Director of Press and Public Relations in the Ministry of Education, Folashade Boriowo, Friday, the initiative will be formally unveiled in August by the Minister of Education, Dr. Tunji Alausa.

Boriowo stated that the minister made the disclosure during a stakeholders’ engagement session held in Abuja in the presence of vice-chancellors, provosts, rectors, student leaders, academic staff, and development partners, and will chart a collective course for nurturing student-led innovation.

The statement noted that the grant targets full-time undergraduate students in STEMM disciplines (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics and Medical Sciences), specifically those in 300 level and above.

“Each selected student-led project will be eligible to receive startup funding of up to N50 million, along with access to mentorship, incubation services and business development support.

“The initiative will be implemented in partnership with the Bank of Industry (BoI) to ensure financial transparency, impact measurement and effective project execution.

“S-VCG is not just a grant. It’s a launchpad for bold, young innovators to lead Nigeria’s industrial and technological transformation,” said Alausa.

Speaking at the session, the Minister of State for Education, Prof. Suwaiba Sa’id Ahmad, described the grant as a strategic investment in Nigeria’s knowledge economy.

“We’re building a stronger, more competitive future by supporting innovation from the ground up,” she said, adding that the programme’s design was informed by months of consultation with students, faculty and institutional leaders.

Participants at the event welcomed the STEMM-Up Grant as a timely, strategic and high-impact initiative that will drive youth innovation, tackle graduate unemployment, and position Nigeria as a hub for student-led entrepreneurship in Africa.

 


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