Rice crop insurance in Indonesia: Adaptation to climate and farm production support

Abstract

Indonesia's Rice Crop Insurance (AUTP) scheme has successfully protected farmers from significant crop losses due to natural disasters. However, the current amount of AUTP's compensation is still unable to accommodate farmer's financing costs (i.e., unpaid micro-loan and its interests) to support crops production. This results in higher micro-loan risk and hinder the sustainability of farming enterprises. In this regard, the existing People's Business Credit (KUR) should supposedly be accessible as a micro-loan source to help farmers fund their farms. This study has two objectives: (1) formulate an integration scheme between KUR and AUTP, and (2) determine the appropriate insurance premiums to meet the farmer's operational and financing costs. This research used 100,000 Monte Carlo Simulations using lognormal distributions with assumptions based on the results of focus group discussion and in-depth interviews with farmer groups, the local Agriculture Service, and micro-loan distributors, as well as the data from the Ministry of Agriculture from the period of 2018-2020. Additionally, Individual Area Yield Index (I-AYI) policy and loss ratio is used to determine and evaluate the new integrated crop insurance premiums. The study revealed that the farmers expect affordable, accessible, and beneficial insurance products with premium subsidies bundled with KUR. Therefore, the government should develop an integration of crop insurance with KUR and determine the affordable premium calculations along with the insurance companies. Based on the simulation results, the total pure premium is estimated around IDR 1 million for a minimum KUR loan of IDR 8 million (suitable for farming costs).