Disaster mitigation through biodiversity
How can permaculture initiatives improve disaster resilience, and why should insurers care?
Farmers have always been at the mercy of the weather, and while damage to buildings and infrastructure from natural disasters is devastating, often we overlook the ways in which climate events can affect agriculture. Especially in rural regions, losing crops and land can be devastating to people’s livelihoods, destroy food sources and increase hunger.
According to the American Farm Bureau Federation, in 2022, major natural disasters caused over $21.4 billion of damage, with around $10 billion of those losses being uninsured. Around $20.4 billion of those losses were attributed to drought and wildfires, while the remaining damages were caused by hurricanes, hail, flooding and other severe weather events.
So, what can we do to create more sustainable, disaster-resilient agricultural systems and communities, and what role do insurers play in that process?
In this episode of Insurance Speak, we are joined by Eloisa Lewis and Shawn Magill with New Climate Culture – a climate change think tank comprised of researchers and creatives working toward solutions to reverse global warming.
Lewis is a climate scientist and founder of New Climate Culture. She is a frequent speaker at global events on topics ranging from decolonizing built environments, to the future of psychedelics, to the role of permaculture in preventing natural disasters.
Magill is a hemp farmer, plant chemist and permaculture designer with a Bachelor of Science in Medicinal Plant Chemistry from Northern Michigan University. After college, he moved back home to Connecticut to start a hemp farm with his childhood best friend, Jacob Honig. He joined New Climate Culture as their hemp expert, one of their east-coast-based designers, and a contributor to the goal of spreading permaculture, building resilient systems and locally producing an abundance of food.
Lewis and Magill sat down with Insurance Speak to share their expertise on the ways in which biodiversity and permaculture initiatives can mitigate disaster risk for not only those whose livelihood relies on agriculture, but for wider communities who depend on these necessary food and material sources.
To hear the full conversation about the ways in which permaculture initiatives can improve disaster resilience, why insurers should care and how carriers can encourage their customers to explore these strategies, listen to the podcast above or subscribe to Insurance Speak on Spotify, Apple Music or Libsyn.