Winners of UNDP’s 3IC Challenge share their journey after winning the maiden insurance competition

The winners of the inaugural Inclusive Insurance Innovation Challenge (3IC), organised by the United Nations Development Programme, in partnership with the National Insurance Commission (NIC), have shared a progress report on their innovations.

The progress report was shared at a showcase held at the UNDP head office in Accra on April 22, 2026, with two of the innovators, as well as staff of the programme and the NIC, in attendance.

The innovators shared how their journey has been so far after winning the competition in 2025, including the acceptability of the insurance packages they developed and the challenges they have been facing.

Derrick Awumey, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and Founder of AgriCom Assurance, winners of the 2025 edition of the 3IC Challenge, indicated that winning the competition is helping them surmount a major hurdle they had in the past, which was obtaining an actuarial memorandum.

“Before UNDP, we were still building our actuarial memorandum that would get us into the (sic).. But through the 3IC programme, we've been able to get the services of an actuarial service provider, which was provided on a pro bono basis,” he said.



Derrick Awumey speaking at the event:

The founder of AgriCom Assurance said that the programme has given them credibility, leading to more funding opportunities and international recognition.

“And also through the 3IC programme, we've been able to get into certain other accelerator programmes, through which we've been able to raise funding because of the credibility the programme gave us, as well as some other global recognition.

“During International Women's Day, agriculture insurance was celebrated as one of the top three insurance companies globally helping to provide access to insurance for rural women, particularly farmers. So I believe these and many more are because of our participation with UNDP and the National Insurance Commission of Ghana,” he said.

Touching on his innovation, Derrick Awumey said it offers cutting-edge technology such as satellite intelligence, predictive AI, and geospatial technology to provide data-driven agricultural insurance to smallholder farmers, protecting them from drought, flood, pest and disease attacks.

He further explained that the insurance package first mitigates the impact of risks on farmers and, if a disaster (drought, flood, pest and disease attacks) occurs, the insurance compensates the farmers with seeds, fertilisers, and cash to start again.

On his part, the CEO of WellMax Inclusive Insurance Limited, the first runner-up of the 2025 3IC Challenge, Dr Maxwell Ampong, said that the challenge helped them actualise the concept they had for the insurance package.

Dr Maxwell Ampong

He also stated that the programme has helped them come up with an issuance page that is easily accessible to Ghanaians, especially small business owners in rural communities.

“The journey started with UNDP. For me, it was UNDP that validated this idea. This has always been a theory, a concept, until we joined the challenge, and we felt like we had something on our hands. We can actually push this as far as possible.

“The assistance from the UNDP and the NIC is what we are using right now to be able to create something that is easily accessible, easily affordable, and efficacious,” he added.

The UNDP and NIC executives, on the other hand, helped proffer solutions to the challenges faced by the innovators in order to make insurance available to every Ghanaian.

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About the 3IC Challenge:

The UNDP, in partnership with the NIC, officially launched the Inclusive Insurance Innovation Challenge (3IC) in 2025 as a catalyst for the development of innovative insurance solutions that enhance financial resilience among Ghana's most vulnerable communities.

The initiative, implemented through UNDP's Insurance and Risk Finance Facility (IRFF), aims to foster inclusive and accessible insurance products tailored to the needs of underserved populations, including informal sector workers, smallholder farmers, traders, persons with disabilities, young women, and people in climate-vulnerable areas.

The 2025 edition of the challenge called on young entrepreneurs, insurtechs, fintechs, insurers, students, and socially driven enterprises to submit ideas under five key thematic areas: Agricultural and Climate Risk Insurance, Building Resilience Among Young Women, Digital Innovation for Inclusive Insurance, Nature-Based Resilience Building, and Empowering Persons with Disabilities.

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