Led by agtech platform Mayani and insurtech firm Hillridge Technology, the pilot offers parametric climate protection.
The index-based insurance uses satellite-derived climate data, including wind speed, wave height, and rainfall, to trigger rapid payouts when extreme weather prevents fishing.
Based on those parameters, the insurance automatically triggers payouts when extreme weather prevents fishing.
At the same time, the initiative offers structured offtake agreements, giving fisherfolk predictable demand and fairer pricing.
“We saw that smallholder income instability drives climate risk exposure and negative coping activities by our rural fisherfolk. Thus, Mayani is pushing for climate adaptation interventions that address the need for income predictability, not just timely climate information or post-disaster recovery support. Fundamentally, integrated financial and market mechanisms are crucial enablers of adaptive behavior,” said Ochie San Juan, co-founder and chief farmer of Mayani.
The pilot will run for a year in in two administrative division within the province of Batangas with the aim to expand the program nationwide if successful.
It is backed by The UK’s Foreign, Commonwealth, and Development Office through the Frontier Tech Hub.
The funding is characterised as risk-tolerant catalytic capital, designed to test frontier innovations and generate evidence that could crowd in larger-scale private investment.
A shield for fisherfolk
Around 1.2 million small-scale fisherfolk in the Philippines are vulnerable to extreme weather events, yet only 2 per cent have any form of risk transfer protection.
The Philippines has experienced an increasing trend in super-typhoons, highlighted JT Solis, co-founder and CEO of Mayani.
“We belong to the typhoon belt, and we get about 20 to 25 typhoons a year with each subsequent typhoon actually becoming stronger than the previous one,” he told AgTechNavigator.
When intense wind speeds, waves, and rainfall, fisherfolk are physically unable or legally prohibited from going out to sea.
San Juan emphasised the importance of timely insurance payouts in those events, stressing that conventional insurance usually required post-event damage assessments.
While land-based farmers in the Philippines can access crop insurance through the Philippine Crop Insurance Corporation, coverage for fisherfolk is limited and structurally inadequate.
For fisherfolk, that means visible and assessable damages, such as destroyed homes or infrastructure are required. Moreover, claim processing can take six months to one year.
Sometimes, lost fishing days due to high waves do not leave easily measurable physical damage, making these insurance models poorly suited to fisheries.
San Juan emphasised the financial fragility of fisher households. An estimated US$4 a day per child is often the minimum required to cover basic schooling costs for a child, including transport and meals
This seemingly small daily requirement exerts intense financial pressure on fishing families, said San Juan.
“Sometimes they go out to sea despite high waves and strong winds. They risk their lives to avoid losing their daily income. When they are prevented from fishing, many resort to negative coping strategies, including borrowing from informal lenders charging interest rates as high as 1 per cent per day,” said San Juan.
A key part of the pilot project will be to find out whether fisherfolk are both willing and able to pay for parametric insurance.
Bringing stability
In addition, the fisherfolk will be connected to hotels, supermarkets, and food processors through Mayani, which helps to secure more stable and predictable incomes.
“When it comes to smallholder climate adaptation, development interventions should not just focus on short-term recovery, but also on long-term transformation,” said Solis.
Solis believes building resilience for this community is not merely about post-disaster recovery, but empowering these fishing families to recover, adapt, and cope in the face of recurring extreme weather events.
“This is the reason why the innovation we’re testing is a dual resilience approach, where we combine market access with parametric insurance, so that if an extreme weather event prevents them from fishing within the 15-kilometre municipal zone, there is a way to transfer that risk to an insurer and trigger a claim payout. Because the lived reality is that every day of fishing really counts.”
Beyond insurance and market linkage, the project recognised the need for income diversification.
Typhoons can persist for extended periods, sometimes two weeks or more, and fishing becomes impossible. In such times, affected fishers often take on side jobs in different sectors, such as construction.
To address this, the project aims to propose income diversification, such as engaging in crop production or encouraging women to expand into value-added processing, such as bottled or preserved fish products.