Initiatives for Sustainable Food Supply
First in Industry: Launched Expense Insurance to Contribute to Reducing Food Loss
Sompo Japan began offering insurance that compensates business for donating food by building a new system, in
partnership with Second Harvest Japan, Japan’s first food bank operator, to help reduce food loss by donating food
that, for various reasons, has lost its market value despite still being edible.
Many food products are judged to have no market value for a variety of reasons due to accidents during
transportation, despite there being no damage to the food itself. Meanwhile, food loss reduction, as one of the
Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), is a major challenge facing the food industry.
With this in mind, we developed an insurance product to encourage food companies to donate their food products that
are judged to have lost their market value due to an accident during transportation to Second Harvest Japan by
compensating the insured party for the costs involved in donating. We launched the product in November 2019. Food
donated to Second Harvest Japan is passed on to low income families in need of assistance.
Jointly Developed Stable Procurement and Shipping Support and Insurance Services for Farm Produce Wholesalers and
Intermediate Traders
Sompo Holdings, together with Sompo Japan, Sompo Risk Management and Nihon Unisys, is collaborating to develop a
stable procurement and shipping support service and insurance product for those who act as wholesalers and
intermediate traders of farm produce in the food chain.
The service is being developed by combining knowledge accumulated by each company relating to insurance underwriting
and risk management services for weather risks, data system cooperation in the food chain and AI-based demand
forecasting that uses data retained by the governments and private companies.
This service will support the timely matching by intermediate traders of harvest time in production areas and actual
demand through the provision of relevant forecasts, and encourage both the production side and the demand side to
optimize the balance between supply and demand.
Moreover, Sompo Japan assists intermediate traders in stabilizing their operations by providing insurance that
compensates them for the cost of procuring alternative produce when they are unable to procure crops from the
contracted farms due to abnormal weather or other unforeseen circumstances.
By providing this service, we aim to stabilize and optimize the entire food chain and contribute to the development
of Japan's agriculture and food industries.
Collaboration with an Agritech Venture with the World’s First Seedling Grafting Technology
-- Using Advanced Science and Technology to Help Solve Issues Facing the Food and Agriculture Sectors --
Sompo Japan is collaborating with Gra&Green Inc., an agritech venture that has developed the world’s first technology
for grafting seedlings from different plant species (heterogeneous plant grafting). The two companies have agreed to
work together to create technologies and services that contribute to solving global social issues in the food and
agriculture sectors, including the food crisis, which is one of the SDGs.
In addition, Sompo Holdings invested in Gra&Green on February 7, 2020.
The agricultural industry is currently facing a number of social issues. In Japan, farmers are aging and their number
has fallen due to a lack of successors, while elsewhere in the world the advance of desertification has reduced the
area of cropland. In addition, as the world’s population continues to increase and the food crisis becomes more
serious, productivity-enhancing technologies will be needed to achieve sustainable agriculture.
Gra&Green is a venture company founded in 2017 at Nagoya University that has developed the world’s first
heterogeneous plant grafting technology.* This technology is expected to accelerate the creation of new
crop
varieties, a process that is said to take more than ten years, by reducing time required to a few years. This in
turn will link to solving issues in the food and agricultural sectors, such as the food crisis, by enabling crop
production even on desertified or degraded land that lacks in soil nutrients.
Sompo Japan and Gra&Green aim to improve agricultural productivity from the seed and seedling business, which lies at
the heart of the agricultural production process. The two companies agreed to collaborate in joint initiatives
relating to the research, development and social implementation of advanced science and technology that leads to the
realization of sustainable agriculture.
Going forward, we will use our Group’s customer base to create new varieties of climate-resilient and
disease-resilient crops that meet the needs of farmers. Through research and development of related products and
services, we will help improve agricultural productivity and contribute to solving social issues in the food and
agricultural sectors.
- Grafting is a technique that cuts the stems of two or more crops and glues them together at the cut ends to grow
them as a single crop. Grafting makes it possible to increase yields and control pests without resorting to
genetic modification. Grafting is a common technique. Grafted seedlings are currently used in about 60% of
tomato production and 90% of cucumber production. Traditional grafting techniques were believed to only work on
species in the same family. Gra&Green, however, has successfully grafted different plant species for the first
time in the world. This technology enables the production of crops even in harsh environments. By grafting, for
example, tomatoes with a variety of roots can grow in nutrient-deficient soil.
