Parliament Question: PMFBY as the largest Crop Insurance Scheme in the World

GOVERNMENT OF INDIA MINISTRY OF AGRICULTURE AND FARMERS WELFARE DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE AND FARMERS WELFARE LOK SABHA UNSTARRED QUESTION NO. 2558 TO BE ANSWERED ON THE 05TH AUGUST, 2025 PMFBY AS THE LARGEST CROP INSURANCE SCHEME IN THE WORLD 2558. SHRI P P CHAUDHARY: SMT. HIMADRI SINGH: SMT. MALA RAJYA LAXMI SHAH: SHRI DINESHBHAI MAKWANA: SHRI DULU MAHATO: SHRI BIDYUT BARAN MAHATO: SHRI MANOJ TIWARI: DR. HEMANT VISHNU SAVARA: SHRI KARAN BHUSHAN SINGH: SMT. SMITA UDAY WAGH: MS KANGNA RANAUT: SHRI CHHATRAPAL SINGH GANGWAR: SMT. SANDHYA RAY: SHRI RAJKUMAR CHAHAR: Will the Minister of AGRICULTURE AND FARMERS WELFARE कृ िष एवं िकसान क(cid:670)ाण मं(cid:361)ी be pleased to state: (a) whether the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) is the world's largest crop insurance scheme; (b) if so, the details of the major initiatives taken by the Government to make this possible and the increase in the number of farmers covered under the scheme as a result of the said initiatives particularly in the State of Rajasthan; (c) the details of the total amount of premium paid by farmers since the inception of the scheme, the number of farmers who received compensation/claims settled and the total amount distributed to the farmers during the last five years, State-wise particularly Palghar and Jalgaon districts in Maharashtra; (d) whether any major structural/technological improvements has been made in the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana as compared to the previous crop insurance scheme; and (e) if so, the key innovations introduced—such as digitization, faster claim settlement or use of remote sensing—and their impact on timely and transparent delivery, especially in States like Maharashtra? ANSWER MINISTER OF STATE FOR AGRICULTURE AND FARMERS WELFARE कृ िष एवं िकसान क(cid:670)ाण रा(cid:475) मं(cid:361)ी (SHRI RAMNATH THAKUR) (a) to (e) : Yes Sir. The Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yoajna (PMFBY) is the world’s largest scheme in terms of farmers applications/policies issued. The following steps have been taken by the Government to strengthen implementation of the scheme including increase in coverage of farmer applications, bring transparency, ensure timely settlement of claims and increase awareness of the scheme : Government has undertaken development of National Crop Insurance Portal (NCIP) as a single source of data ensuring subsidy payment, co-ordination, transparency, dissemination of information and delivery of services including direct online enrollment of farmers, uploading/obtaining individual insured famer’s details for better monitoring and to ensure transfer of claim amount electronically to the individual farmer’s Bank Account.  In order to rigorously monitor claim disbursal process, a dedicated module namely ‘Digiclaim Module’ has been operationalized for payment of claims from Kharif 2022 onwards. It involves integration of National Crop Insurance Portal (NCIP) with Public Finance Management System (PFMS) and accounting system of Insurance Companies to provide timely & transparent processing of all claims.  Delinking of Central Government share of premium subsidy from that of State Governments has been implemented so that farmers can get proportionate claims relating to the Central Government share.  Opening of ESCROW Account by the State Government concerned for deposit of their premium share in advance as per provisions of the scheme has been made mandatory w.e.f. Kharif 2025 season.  Also, towards leveraging technology in implementation of the scheme, various steps like capturing of yield data/Crop Cutting Experiments (CCEs) data through CCE-Agri App & uploading it on the NCIP, allowing insurance companies to witness the conduct of CCEs, integration of State land records with NCIP etc. have already been taken to improve timely settlement of the claims to farmers.  Provision of 12% penalty on delay in payment of claims by insurance company is auto calculated on National Crop Insurance Portal (NCIP).  The Government has actively supported the awareness activities being carried out by the States, implementing Insurance Companies, financial institutions, and Common Service Centres (CSCs) network to disseminate key features of PMFBY amongst farmers and members of Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRIs).  Structured awareness campaign ‘Crop Insurance Week/Fasal Bima Saptah’ has been initiated by the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare since Kharif 2021 season onwards. Along with this, ‘Fasal Bima Pathshalas’ are also being organized at village/GP level for knowledge building of farmers on various aspects of scheme implementation.  Government had also organized a nationwide Doorstep Crop Insurance Policy/receipt Distribution mega drive – ‘Meri Policy Mere Haath’. Hard copies of crop insurance policy receipts are distributed to farmers enrolled under PMFBY through special camps at gram Panchayat/village level. Following technologies for Objective Crop Damage & Loss Assessment and transparency have also been implemented recently w.e.f. 2023-24 under the scheme: i. YES-TECH (Yield Estimation System Based on Technology) for gradual migration to Remote-Sensing based yield estimation to help assess yields as well as fair and accurate Crop Yield Estimation. This initiative has been launched for paddy & wheat crops from Kharif 2023 wherein 30% weightage to yield estimation will mandatorily be assigned to YES-TECH derived yield. Soybean crop has been added from Kharif 2024 season. ii. WINDS (Weather Information Network and Data System) for setting up of Network of Automatic Weather Stations (AWS) & Automatic Rain-Gauges (ARG) to the tune of 5 times of existing network for collecting hyper-local weather data at GP & Block level. This will be fed into a National database with interoperability & sharing of data in coordination with India Meteorological Department (IMD). WINDS provides data not only for YES-TECH but also for effective drought & disaster management, accurate weather prediction and offering better parametric insurance products. Due to the aforesaid initiatives taken by the Government, number of farmer applications enrolled in Rajasthan have been increased from 93.56 lakh in 2016-17 to 365.72 lakh in 2024-25. Maharashtra is one of the major States implementing the PMFBY. State-wise details of premium paid by farmers, claims paid and number of farmer application who received claims during last five years under PMFBY alongwith similar details for the Palghar and Jalgaon districts of Maharasthra are given in Annexure.A comparison of features of PMFBY with previous crop insurance schemes are as under : Features National Agricultural Insurance Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Scheme/Previous Insurance Schemes Yojana (PMFBY) Risk In the National Agricultural Insurance The entire risk has to be borne by Transfer Scheme, the claim payment amount in case the insurance company. But w.e.f. of more than 100 percent loss was borne by Kharif 2023, Alternative Risk the State and Central Government. Due to Transfer Methods (ARTM) of 80 : non-availability of budget on time, there was 110 and 60 : 130 have been unnecessary delay in payment of claims. introduced, wherein if Loss ratio is below 80 or 60%, part of the premium is returned to the State Government and claims over 110% or 130% are borne by the Government. Insurance In the previous scheme, the insurance unit The insurance unit has been Unit was Tehsil/Block/District, due to which claim made village/Gram Panchayat, payment was uncertain/not done properly in due to which maximum number of case of damage at the Gram Panchayat farmers get claim payment on the level. basis of actual loss. Coverage of In the previous scheme, mainly the It is voluntary for both loanee and non-loanee insurance of loanee farmers was done non-loanee farmers to get farmers compulsorily through banks, voluntary insurance, and the number of insurance of non-loanee farmers was non-loanee farmers among the negligible. total insured farmers in the scheme is 55% which is more than the loanee farmers. Provision of In the previous scheme, there was no There is also a provision for local local provision for local disaster due to which if disaster in PMFBY, due to which disaster: the crops of one or less farmers were if the crop of even a single farmer damaged, they did not get compensation is damaged, he gets payment. compensation payment. Participation In the previous scheme, the scheme was A total of 20 insurance of insurance implemented in the entire country by only companies, 5 public and 15 companies: one insurance company, private, have been paneled. Use of In the previous scheme, the calculation of Improved technology is also technology: crop loss was done only in the traditional being used in Pradhan Mantri way Fasal Bima Yojana.Annexure PMFBY & RWBCIS: State Wise details of farmers’ share in premium, claims paid and farmer applications benefitted during 2020-21 to 2024-25 as on 30th June, 2025 State/UT Farmers Share in Paid Claims Farmers Premium Applications (Rs. In Crore) Benefitted (In No.) A & N Islands 0.03 0.02 132 Andhra Pradesh 32.5 546.7 6,29,229 Assam 19.4 531.5 7,55,667 Chhattisgarh 1,031.0 3,554.4 81,90,463 Goa 0.02 0.01 71 Haryana 1,439.0 5,858.8 61,40,350 Himachal Pradesh 141.2 362.5 5,60,818 Jammu & Kashmir 41.2 116.9 2,14,692 Jharkhand 0.3 - 36,977 Karnataka 1,584.2 9,513.3 72,08,551 Kerala 50.3 460.6 3,08,833 Madhya Pradesh 3,679.1 12,380.2 2,12,76,949 Maharashtra 2,607.7 24,596.5 3,66,52,082 Manipur 1.8 5.1 9,554 Meghalaya 0.1 23.6 33,539 Odisha 450.5 2,541.3 83,47,096 Puducherry 0.0 8.5 32,644 Rajasthan 4,568.2 16,474.2 3,78,38,088 Sikkim 0.4 0.0 64 Tamil Nadu 807.4 5,577.1 1,13,58,988 Tripura 2.1 9.6 1,15,930 Uttar Pradesh 1,461.6 3,229.1 59,77,880 Uttarakhand 257.0 965.7 6,85,032 Total 18,175.0 86,755.8 14,63,73,629 PMFBY & RWBCIS: details of farmers’ share in premium, claims paid and farmer applications benefitted in Jalgaon and Palghar districts of of Maharashtra from 2020-21 to 2024-25 as on 30th June, 2025 District Farmers Share in Paid Claims Farmers Applications (Maharashtra) premium Benefitted (In No.) (Rs. In Crore) Jalgaon 313.1 1632.8 10,27,813 Palghar 19.3 54.3 42,798 Total 223.3 996.9 20,66,137 *****