China is likely to surpass Japan as the world's second largest insurance market this year, boosted by the surging demand from the ever-growing middle class, the industry regulator said on Thursday.

The country's premium income reached 1.9 trillion yuan ($287.9 billion) in the first six months, a jump of 37.3 percent compared to the same period last year. The growth rate has accelerated, compared with 17.5 percent in the first half of 2014 and 20 percent in the first half of 2015, according to the China Insurance Regulatory Commission.

"A healthy society should not be full of stock investors but policy holders," said Jack Ma, founder and executive chairman of Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.

There are now 330 million policy holders, tripling the number of stock investors, Ma added.