More than 47,000 Ethiopian farming families took out insurance to protect them from potential crop failure caused by climate change.

The insurance cover paid out a total of 35 million Ethiopian Birr (approx. €250k) in compensation to farmers affected by drought and other adverse weather events, data from the project has shown.

The crop insurance scheme was introduced as part of Self Help Africa’s Resilience Initiative Project, which carried out a programme of activities to protect communities across 135 administrative districts of northern Ethiopia (known as kebeles) from the worst effects of changing climate.

Funded by the World Food Programme (WFP), the project supported 54,000 households over a three years period to develop disaster response plans, restore degraded farmland and natural resources, establish village based savings and loans programmes, and create income generating small businesses.

As a part of the work, local communities planted eight million tree seedlings on degraded land, 120 environment management committees were formed, and 53,000 households were trained in natural resource management practices.

17,400 village enterprise group members received small loans to start income generating activities, 4,500 people participated in business skills training courses, and 17,000 farmers accessed agricultural inputs, including seed and fertiliser, to support their farming activities.