Africa buys very little insurance, and Nigeria buys the least

Insurance penetration is premiums measured against GDP. It is a blunt number and it flatters countries with expensive assets, but the gap across Africa is too wide to be an artefact of measurement.

The numbers

• South Africa sits around 11.3 percent of GDP
• Namibia is about 7.4 percent
• Morocco is about 2.1 percent
• Kenya is about 1.2 percent
• The African average is roughly 2.7 percent
• Nigeria is about 0.4 percent

Nigeria has more than 200 million people and fewer than 3 in 100 adults hold any insurance at all. Industry premiums reached about 2.3 trillion naira in the 2025 financial year, which sounds substantial until you set it against the size of the economy.

The reasons people give

Low income and low awareness are the usual explanations and both are real. Neither fully accounts for the gap with Kenya, which is not a wealthier country per head by the margin the penetration figures would suggest.

The explanation that gets less airtime is trust. A lot of Nigerians know somebody who made a claim and did not get paid, or who paid for a motor certificate that turned out to be worthless. That memory travels further than any advertising campaign, and it is rational to act on it.

What is actually changing

• Compulsory classes are being enforced more consistently, particularly motor, where a central certificate database made fake papers easier to spot
• Bancassurance and telco distribution are putting small policies in front of people who would never walk into an insurer's office
• Recapitalisation has pushed weaker underwriters out, which is unglamorous but matters if you want claims paid

None of that fixes trust quickly. Trust is rebuilt one paid claim at a time, and that is slow work.

Figures are drawn from published industry and press reporting for 2025 and move year to year. Treat them as orders of magnitude rather than precise measures.