Ghana is moving from reactive disaster response to planned, predictable, and people-centred climate resilience, with the recent release of a sub-sovereign flood risk insurance product for the Greater Accra Metropolitan Area (GAMA).
In a blog on the UNDP website, Dr Amina Sammo, who is UNDP Ghana's Insurance and Risk Finance Facility National Coordinator, said, "This is more than an insurance product; it is a new architecture for managing climate risk and protecting development gains.”
She wrote, "This moment marks the culmination of a multi-year journey, one that brings together government leadership, private sector expertise and development partnership to answer a simple but powerful question: How do we ensure that when floods strike, support reaches people faster, and recovery does not deepen vulnerability?"
Why flood insurance matters for Accra
Greater Accra is the economic heartbeat of Ghana and home to millions of people whose lives and livelihoods are increasingly exposed to climate-induced flooding. Each major flood damages homes, disrupts informal businesses, overwhelms public services and diverts scarce public resources away from long-term development.
Traditionally, disaster response has relied heavily on post-event budget reallocations, and emergency appeals are often slow, uncertain and costly. The result is delayed assistance and prolonged recovery for the most vulnerable.
Designing an architecture for resilience
Under the leadership of the Government of Ghana, and with technical support from Insurance Development Forum (IDF) and UNDP’s Insurance and Risk Finance Facility (IRFF), Ghana embarked on the complex task of designing a sub-sovereign risk financing solution tailored to Accra’s unique flood risk profile. This was not about importing an off-the-shelf product. It required building an entire risk financing architecture, including:
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Flood risk modelling and data analysis to understand where, how and when losses occur
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Parametric insurance design, using objective triggers such as excess rainfall and flood extent
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Institutional coordination across the Ministry of Finance, National Insurance Commission and the National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO)
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A flood contingency plan to ensure that insurance payouts are translated quickly into life-saving and livelihood-protecting actions.
At its core, this initiative is about protecting people and development gains. For vulnerable communities, it means faster assistance and reduced disruption to livelihoods. For public institutions, it means reduced fiscal shock and better disaster preparedness. For Ghana’s development pathway, it means safeguarding investments against climate risk. Importantly, this sub-sovereign solution complements Ghana’s existing sovereign disaster risk financing instruments, strengthening the country’s overall financial resilience framework.