Fit for the job It’s easy enough for us to drop into the doctor’s surgery when there’s something troubling us. But for your average Ghanaian cocoa farmer, the first signs of ill health could be the start of a journey which ends up with the mortgage of his entire year’s harvest.
When the community chiefs asked us to help get their villagers into the newly-emerging Ghanaian Health Insurance Scheme, we were concerned about that crutch of support. How would farmers ever be able to help themselves if they were dependent upon us for their premiums? This was something which Hotel Chocolat’s director, Lynn, debated at length on one of her annual visits to our projects there.
“I’m pleased with the results of our health insurance support and even more so because we invited our Club members to donate to the project, and they raised more than £10,000 in contributions. We’ve seen nearly 1000 families getting themselves onto the ladder of self-help. We committed to a 5-year programme during which we promised to pay a decreasing proportion of the farmers’ premiums year on year. By the end of the 5 years we hoped that there would be a significant number of farmers who had been able to save up for themselves during the year, and understand the benefits of investing in the insurance.”
And that’s exactly what has happened. Although we lost more than 100 of the poorest families from the scheme in the first year, several hundred others are now well on their way to paying their full annual premium. And others, more sceptical about getting involved, have seen the benefits of health insurance, as their friends in the scheme have received outpatient treatment for snake bites, machete laceration and other previously unaffordable common treatments, as well as the occasional inpatient operation to treat hernias – common in farmers whose days include heavy manual labour.
With the health insurance scheme we have found the benefits to be just as much about awareness raising within the community – to really help villagers understand the benefit of investing in insurance, as it is about the treatment. But we could only know and understand that by being there and seeing it for ourselves. It’s what makes it real for us, and for our Tasting Club members.
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