[Nhcoll-l] Insurance collections

[Robert Waller]

John explains the problem of collection and collection item replacement value very well. Clearly, that kind of insurance makes little sense for large natural science collections. The problem is not that our collections have little value, although they may be perceived that way. I would argue they are closer to priceless because they cannot be replaced. Insurance on a collection item basis might make sense in a few limited situations. A tree cookie serving an exhibit and education purpose might be replaced by another item providing equal exhibit and education value. Similarly, if a collection is lost, since it is irreplaceable, the only sensible compensation to an institution would be a payment that could, to some extent, restore the institution's ability to deliver on its mandate. Ideally, to the extent that the now lost collection has been doing. That will be difficult to characterize and quantify but I believe it is the only rational basis for insuring an entire collection, or a significant portion of a whole collection.
Insurance is a risk management strategy categorized as "transfer the risk", as opposed to "avoid the risk", "accept the risk" or "mitigate the risk". It makes perfect sense when applied to facilities, major equipment, and liabilities, but requires a different way of framing the issues to make sense for scientific or other heritage collections. The more sensible risk management strategy for caring for natural science collections is one of "mitigate the risk", i.e., through improved collection care guided by collection risk analysis.

In your situation, I would consider, and possibly cost, insurance for any individual items where a replacement value, not for the specific item, but for something to fulfill its purpose, could be worked out. There may be few or no such items. Then I would roughly quantify the value of the whole collection for delivering the institution's mandate, or  delivering on its mission, then obtain an insurance cost estimate for that. Even an order of magnitude estimate would be useful. Separately, after putting good faith effort into doing that, I would raise the idea that collection risk management is not just important but critical. However, the risk management strategy of "transfer the risk" is not a useful option. Instead, the cost of that insurance would be better invested in an appropriate risk management strategy: collection risk analysis and management. I do not expect that would result in an immediate windfall of new resources for collection care but, I do think it is what we, as a field, need to work toward.
Rob


________________________________
From: Nhcoll-l <nhcoll-l-bounces at mailman.yale.edu> on behalf of John E Simmons <simmons.johne at gmail.com>
Sent: Tuesday, January 27, 2026 4:58 AM
To: Ann Bogaerts <ann.bogaerts at plantentuinmeise.be>
Cc: NHCOLL-new <nhcoll-l at mailman.yale.edu>
Subject: Re: [Nhcoll-l] Insurance collections

Insurance is based on replacement cost, which is where we run into problems trying to insure natural history collections. You can calculate the cost per herbarium sheet or per specimen of collecting, processing, and storing the object (which has been recently done for mammals). However, the real value in scientific specimens is that they are not replaceable--you can't go back in time and re-collect a true replacement because one of the values of specimens is that they are time-based. You can also search sites that sell natural history specimens--it is shocking how many specimens are available for purchase, including human remains, but the prices on those are not reflective of getting replacements, just what the limited market value of old specimens is.

The cost to collect and process another specimen to "replace" the one that is lost means putting a financial value on your collection that is based solely on collecting more things like what you have now. There is no way to calculate the financial worth of research vouchers, future research, and so forth. This is okay until some administrator or overlord decides that your collection is not worth enough money to occupy the space it does, or that your herbarium is worth less than the collection in the art museum down the street (which will have a much higher value per object because there is a big art market). You are then faced with having to justify why your low dollar value collection should have a home.

Before you give up, you should talk to a few fine arts insurers about your particular circumstances, because they are used to working with museums and with odd things that have odd values. If you go to the website of ARCS (the Association of Registrars and Collections Specialists) and click on the section for most recent meeting (in St Louis last November) you will find the logos of a number of insurance companies who were sponsors of the meeting--that list can help you find fine arts insurers to talk to.

Good luck.

--John

John E. Simmons
Writer and Museum Consultant
Museologica
and
Research Associate, Earth and Mineral Sciences Museum & Art Gallery
Penn State University
and
Investigador Asociado, Departamento de Ornitologia
Museo de Historia Natural, Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos, Lima


On Mon, Jan 26, 2026 at 10:46 AM Ann Bogaerts <ann.bogaerts at plantentuinmeise.be<mailto:ann.bogaerts at plantentuinmeise.be>> wrote:

Dear all,

I would like to ask whether your herbarium or other natural history collections are insured. If so, could you please explain how the insurance value of these collections is determined?

Thank you in advance for your time and assistance. I look forward to your response.

Kind regards,

Ann

--
Ann Bogaerts
Scientific Manager Herbarium BR
Meise Botanic Garden
Nieuwelaan 38
BE-1860 Meise
++32 2 260 09 57


_______________________________________________
Nhcoll-l mailing list
Nhcoll-l at mailman.yale.edu<mailto:Nhcoll-l at mailman.yale.edu>
https://mailman.yale.edu/mailman/listinfo/nhcoll-l

_______________________________________________
NHCOLL-L is brought to you by the Society for the Preservation of
Natural History Collections (SPNHC), an international society whose
mission is to improve the preservation, conservation and management of
natural history collections to ensure their continuing value to
society. See http://www.spnhc.org for membership information.
Advertising on NH-COLL-L is inappropriate.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mailman.yale.edu/pipermail/nhcoll-l/attachments/20260127/31a60664/attachment.html>