Climbs humble beginning in Cagayan de Oro

BY JOE PALABAO
COOP Life Insurance and Mutual Benefit Services (CLIMBS), a cooperative insurance in the country duly licensed to operate Life Insurance Business by the Insurance Commission, has its humble beginnings 36 years ago in Cagayan de Oro City.

CLIMBS was founded by coop pioneers in the country, Atty. Mordina R. Cua and the late Aquilino Pimentel, Sr., the father of Sen. Nene Pimentel, and managed by Canadian cooperative insurance-trained by Fermin L. Gonzales, president and CEO, and Judge Esperanza Garcia as BOD-Chairperson of CFI Cooperative, the biggest in the Visayas with over a Billion Asset based in Cebu City.

Gonzales hails from a multi-million coop, Nabunturan Integrated Cooperative (NICO) of Compostela Valley Province.

CLIMS was organized in 1971 by the Misamis Oriental-Bukidnon-Camiguin Federation of Cooperatives (MBC) and the Southern Philippines Educational Cooperative Center (SPECC). An organization owned and operated by cooperatives, its affiliates, self-help groups and NGOs nationwide and was organized to provide mutual protection and insurance services to its members. It started only as one of the servicing window of SPECC (MASS-SPECC) today, until it has spinned-off and became independent in 1975.

It is guided with a corporate vision for a strong and effective mutual protection system based on cooperative and humane values committed to service excellence thereby enhancing the dignity and equality of life; COOP LIFE Insurance Mutual Benefit Services tagged as the “The Grassroots Insurance” offers a complete line of Insurance Services from Group Term Life Insurance, Individual Life Insurance, and Non-Life Insurance to coop members. It has area offices in Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao with its head office at CLIMBS Bldg., Upper Zone 5, National Highway, Bulua, Cagayan de Oro City.

CLIMBS is in partnership with Philippine Prudential Life Insurance as their re-insurer and investor and the CCC Insurance Corporation as non-life insurance provider and has linkages with the Philippine Life Insurance Association, Inc. (PLIA), the International Cooperative and Mutual Insurance Federation (ICMIF) and Asia Oceania Association of ICMIF (AOA).

To date, CLIMBS has a total asset of P307,958.093, with an all- time high net surplus ofP20.6 million. This is an indication that CLIMBS is already in the mainstream of the insurance industry in the country with the confidence of its growing members and investors. Membership of CLIMBS is now in the vicinity of 2,000 or 10 percent of the 20,000 primary operating cooperatives throughout the country registered with the Cooperative Development Authority or CDA.