Inclusive insurance solutions—from micro policies to femtech-driven products—are emerging to close the protection gap for women and build financial resilience for families.
Women shoulder more financial risk than men, yet the insurance sector still treats them as an afterthought. In much of Asia and the Pacific, barely half of women receive any kind of social-protection benefit, and fewer than one in three pays into a pension.
Lower pay, unpaid caregiving, and broken career paths chip away at lifetime earnings; by retirement, women’s incomes are typically a quarter to a third lower than men’s—despite their longer life expectancy. The result is a protection gap that exposes millions of households to poverty if illness, disability, disaster, or old age strikes.
The industry’s product menu has long been built around a man’s uninterrupted career. Premiums often assume women are riskier to insure, exclude fertility care and maternity costs, or offer non-working spouses only half the coverage linked to a husband’s salary.
Informality and education gaps compound the problem. A vegetable vendor in Manila or a sari weaver in Jaipur rarely meets an agent, let alone deciphers a twenty-page policy; forms go unsigned, nominees stay uninformed, and vast sums of life-insurance proceeds languish unclaimed.
Yet practical solutions are already thriving on the margins. India’s low-cost micro-life policy, the Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Bima Yojana, accepts premium payments through auto-debit of savings bank accounts and still delivers a meaningful death benefit.
Japan’s women agents have rebuilt life cover around female-specific illnesses such as breast cancer, while Kenya’s Linda Jamii and the Philippines’ CARD MRI bundle inexpensive health, life, and disaster protection for low-income women.
In the cyclone belts of Bangladesh and flood-prone plains of Nepal, crop and livestock micro-insurance now save women farmers from destitution after each typhoon or flood.
Even heatwaves are insurable: new parametric products in India pay women automatically when temperatures cross a dangerous threshold, replacing lost earnings without tedious claims paperwork.
These gains hint at what a truly inclusive insurance market could look like. Regulators can accelerate change by forcing transparent disclosures, ensuring policies travel with gig workers, and rewarding companies that design products around women’s life stages.
Technology firms can help by weaving femtech data—fertility trackers, pregnancy monitors, menopause apps—into underwriting models, but only with clear consent and ironclad privacy. Automated onboarding should block a policy from being issued until nominee details are complete and verified, ending the scourge of unclaimed benefits.
Change also begins at home. Women need to be informed not only about purchasing insurance, but also about how to access payments when needed and how to navigate the insurance process during emergencies. It’s crucial for women to understand how to reach out to insurance companies effectively and what steps to take in case of a claim.
For those who already have insurance coverage, it’s important to regularly review policies, ensure nominee information is up-to-date, and store documents in an accessible place where family members can find them quickly in case of an emergency.
Communities can amplify outreach through health workers, women’s groups, microfinance branches, local media, and door-to-door enrollment drives, turning complex jargon into plain talk that fits a village meeting.
Closing this gap is not charity. The SheForShield Report estimates the industry could unlock $1.7 trillion in new annual premium revenue by 2030 if it serves women properly.
More important, fully insured women are far less likely to pull children from school, raid meager savings, or depend on relatives when crisis hits. A fair insurance system is therefore an investment in stronger families, more resilient communities, and an economy that finally recognizes women’s financial freedom as everyone’s shared gain.
Source: blogs.adb.org
