Rural businesses in Saskatchewan face rising risks with little support, trapped by insurance models built for cities, not the communities driving the province’s economy.
“Many products the insurance companies design are meant for larger urban centers,” said Thomas Beswick (pictured), vice president at Aon Risk Solutions.
With Saskatchewan’s economy anchored by agriculture, construction, and manufacturing, now a $5 billion contributor to provincial GDP, rural operations are often left underinsured or priced out entirely.
Nearly 94% of Saskatchewan’s 1,984 manufacturing establishments are small businesses, yet many lack direct access to specialized insurance support. “There are rural areas that often lack easy access to knowledgeable insurance professionals,” Beswick said.
Beswick sees recovery, not just reimbursement, as the priority. “The insurers should really focus on not just simply indemnifying these losses, but actually promoting resilience,” he said. That includes rewarding mitigation efforts with premium credits and exploring faster solutions like parametric insurance.
But this won’t work without a mindset shift: “We try to position ourselves as their trusted advisors,” he said, helping clients embed insurance into operations, not just treat it as paperwork.
These mismatches leave rural businesses especially vulnerable when disruption hits. Beswick, who now focuses more on mid to large firms, remembers the toll smaller operations faced after unexpected events.
"Contractors especially need to hedge, make educated guesses at this point, and protect themselves," he said. "Contract reviews are very important for Construction companies right now, making sure the contracts they're entering into are mutually beneficial for all parties involved."
Climate volatility is part of the problem, but Beswick pointed to an even broader landscape of instability – economic shifts, regulatory changes, and supply chain fragility. For him, it's not just about coverage anymore, but about the capacity to recover.
"The insurers should focus on not just simply indemnifying these losses, but actually promoting resilience," he said.
That could mean rewarding risk mitigation strategies with tangible benefits. "This could mean premium credits for businesses that invest in mitigation, such as flood defenses, drought-resistant infrastructure, and fire preventative measures," he said.
And for businesses needing speed, parametric insurance has emerged as a promising stopgap. "The lengthy claim process can be pretty painful for some, so the parametric coverage is a nice stopgap for a lot of that."
However, none of these solutions work without a mindset shift – from viewing insurance as a transactional commodity to embedding it as a strategic priority. At Aon, Beswick said his team sees their role as long-term advisors rather than policy sellers.
"We focus on moving away from traditional selling of the insurance product and instead, position ourselves as their trusted advisors," he said.
That advisory role includes identifying emerging risks, like cyberattacks or logistics bottlenecks, and helping clients manage them sustainably and cost-effectively. It also includes keeping pace with a new generation of entrepreneurs, who bring fresh expectations into the industry.
"Transparency is huge for them. Speed, digital service, digital-first," Beswick said. These clients expect tailored services, not boilerplate language. "They don't typically like to see a one-size-fits-all, they prefer a more tailored solution.”
Paper-heavy processes and industry jargon don't fly anymore. "Your clients aren't interested in a lot of paper heavy transactions," Beswick said. "Communication with them should be jargon-free."
This is where the rural-urban divide becomes most apparent. While tech-enabled services are becoming standard in cities, many rural areas lack the infrastructure and innovation to keep up, widening an already dangerous gap in coverage and accessibility.
But Beswick doesn't believe in shortcuts. He believes the solution lies in rethinking the fundamentals – rewarding risk management, championing local expertise, and ensuring that insurance becomes part of operational strategy.
"We try to be proactive, to help manage their risk at a cost-effective rate. The goal is to help clients see insurance as part of a broader resilience and growth strategy, rather than a compliance requirement, " he said.
That becomes the real challenge: not just selling more insurance, but helping businesses build resilience to keep going, even when everything else grinds to a halt.
