Malawi's savings and credit co-operatives venture into insurance

MUSCCO CEO, Sylvester Kadzola, said they intend to create a one-stop-all package of service delivery.

“We want to offer competitive and affordable packages to all our members and that will be done if our members can also insure things much easily within their means,” he said.

Kadzola said MUSCCO would register the insurance co-operatives as a separate subsidiary to offer life, property and financial insurance service.

MUSCCO, which represents 64 savings and credit co-operatives (SACCOs) in Malawi, met in Lilongwe to strategise on how best to take up the matter.

This year's meeting, themed “SACCOs consolidating growth through diversification of financial products and services,” covered venturing into insurance.

“We want to go beyond loans and savings,” declared Kadzola who said the venture is in emulation of how SACCOs run in Kenya.

During the meeting, managing director of the Co-operative Insurance Company of Kenya, Nelson Kuria, attended the meeting, where he taught the Malawi SACCOs on how best to go about engaging in insurance services.

“Since Kenya SACCOs are the eighth largest movement globally and number one in Africa, we look up to them for our lessons,” said Kadzola.

By December last year, the total assets base for the SACCOs under MUSCCO was at K1,2bn, but by May this year it had grown to around K1,4bn.