AXA Climate extends partnership with satellite data firm

AXA Climate has extended its strategic partnership with data analytics provider Planet Labs.

The partnership offers satellite data-driven insights for the development of parametric insurance products to help protect farmers against the effects of drought.

AXA Climate offers drought insurance services that estimate crop yield and losses. The parametric insurance product automatically triggers payouts within a few days of the end of a risk period, the companies said. This enables farmers, suppliers, processors and other agricultural stakeholders to quickly receive compensation.

“With Planet’s unique satellite data, AXA Climate has been able to provide a high-quality index insurance coverage service for farmers and cooperatives,” said Antoine Denoix, CEO of AXA Climate. “We can now act quickly to help farmers and stakeholders combat the major threat of drought to agriculture around the world.”

Planet Labs owns and operates the world’s largest fleet of Earth observation satellites, with about 200 currently in orbit. The company collects an image of every land-based location on the planet on nearly a daily basis, generating a massive data set.

This is combined with public satellite data to continuously measure and quantify the changing conditions on the Earth’s surface, including soil moisture.

With Planet’s Planetary Variables Soil Water Content data feed, AXA Climate receives a measurement of the volume of water contained in soil to a depth of about five centimeters, Planet said. That information helps AXA Climate determine the risk for drought-related losses.

“These Planetary Variables provide accurate, daily, global measurements,” said Will Marshall, CEO of Planet Labs. “AXA Climate is using our Soil Water Content variable to monitor, and then provide automatic payments if the soil moisture gets below a certain percent for more than a number of days. This offers a powerful service that can support global farmers in critical situations. Abstracting out critical measurables from satellite data enables our customers to reach larger value, enable new applications, and thus more customers to get value from Planet’s data.”

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