Publication:
Political Champions Partnership for Stimulating Insurance Penetration in Lower Income Countries: Initial Market Surveys Summary Note

Loading...
Thumbnail Image
Files in English
English PDF (917.22 KB)
169 downloads
English Text (24.84 KB)
17 downloads
Date
2014-09-25
ISSN
Published
2014-09-25
Author(s)
Editor(s)
Abstract
After the last Champions’ meeting in April, an expert-level group consisting of donors, insurers and international financial institutions was formed to act on the decision to undertake joint work to scale up disaster risk insurance in lower income countries. Seven countries were selected: Bangladesh, Ghana, Haiti, Kenya, Senegal, Tanzania and Vietnam. The World Bank/Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery (GDFRR) led in preparing country scoping studies with inputs from the group. These were summarized in a set of country notes. From the country scoping studies, the expert-level group proposes that Kenya, Bangladesh and Senegal are selected for the next phase. This will involve confirming the interest and commitment of the governments to engage in this initiative and undertaking field visits to conduct more detailed, in-country assessment to identify opportunities for scaling up insurance in support of building resilience. Each assessment will result in a recommended program of investment to stimulate insurance scale up. This will include recommendations on how to improve the coordination of existing efforts, how to fill gaps (such as continued investment in market infrastructure), how to scale up pilot initiatives and how to better link insurance solutions to existing financial products (such as credit) and social protection programs. By early 2014, the assessments will be completed. By April 2014, the recommended program of investment for each country will be presented to the donor and insurance community involved in this Political Champions’ initiative for their consideration and commitment of support.
Link to Data Set
Citation
World Bank. 2014. Political Champions Partnership for Stimulating Insurance Penetration in Lower Income Countries: Initial Market Surveys Summary Note. © World Bank. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/22432 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO.
Associated URLs
Associated content
Report Series
Other publications in this report series
Journal
Journal Volume
Journal Issue

Related items

Showing items related by metadata.

  • Publication
    Insurance against Climate Change : Financial Disaster Risk Management and Insurance Options for Climate Change Adaptation in Bulgaria
    (Washington, DC, 2014) World Bank Group
    Bulgaria is exposed to nearly all types of climate extremes, including floods, droughts, and others, as well as earthquakes. The combination of insurance products, early warning systems, information campaigns, infrastructure adaptation measures, and strict regulations can be very useful in tackling the negative climate change impacts. This note provides an overview of the insurance sector s contribution to climate change - related risk prevention and highlights some of Bulgaria s ongoing disaster risk management (DRM) efforts. The note aims to raise awareness and emphasize the role that financial disaster risk management (FDRM), including insurance, can have in climate change adaptation. Based on a desk review and preliminary in-country stakeholder consultations, the note s findings are meant to motivate new thinking and serve as an engagement tool for ongoing in-country discussions, as well to help identify analytical work to be carried out in the future. Based on the preliminary review of Bulgaria s specific context, several ideas are being put forward to be further explored in the ongoing discussions toward creating FDRM products to address the major natural disasters (in particular, floods, droughts, and earthquakes) and improving adaptation to climate change. Potential areas of analysis that can be further explored and, as such, plant a seed for future action can focus on promoting risk prevention and deploying insurance instruments, including issues around traditional risk management, technology innovation, compulsory disaster insurance, forecast insurance, and disaster insurance pools. The analysis which will assess the extent of vulnerability of the subjects covered by existing insurance products, can subsequently lead to the decisions on priority insurance products to be introduced in the future.
  • Publication
    Disaster Risk Financing and Insurance in Sub-Saharan Africa
    (Washington, DC, 2012-11) World Bank
    This policy note is a preliminary effort to present a body of knowledge on the state of disaster risk financing and insurance in Sub-Saharan Africa. It aims to contribute to a strengthened understanding and collective knowledge within Sub-Saharan Africa on disaster risk financing and insurance, and to encourage open dialogue between stakeholders on how strategies can best be developed to increase financial resilience against natural disasters. The report is targeted at policy-makers and actors in the international community with an interest in this agenda. In the context of this report, disaster risk financing and insurance refers to instruments and mechanisms at the macro, market and micro level that provide financial resources to assist with response and recovery efforts in the aftermath of a disaster. This report focuses on natural disasters, which we can describe as unforeseen events driven by natural phenomena that cause serious disruption of the functioning of a community or a society causing widespread human, material, economic and/or environmental losses which overwhelm the capacity of the affected community or society. This report discusses rapid onset disasters such as cyclones, earthquakes and floods but also slow onset events such as drought. Sub-Saharan African countries are highly exposed to a wide range of adverse natural events, with hydro-meteorological hazards impacting the largest number of people. Disaster risk financing and insurance (DRFI) has been highlighted by the African union, regional economic communities and individual countries as an area for regional financial cooperation.
  • Publication
    Catastrophe Risk Financing in Developing Countries : Principles for Public Intervention
    (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2009) Cummins, J. David; Mahul, Olivier
    Public intervention in catastrophe insurance markets, supported by the donor community and the World Bank, should be country specific. Low-income countries, where the domestic non-life insurance market is undeveloped, should focus in the short term on the development of sovereign catastrophe insurance solutions and the promotion of public goods related to risk market infrastructure. These countries are usually not mature enough for the promotion of catastrophe insurance pools for private homeowners. Middle-income countries, where the domestic non-life insurance market is more developed, should help the private insurance industry offer market-based catastrophe insurance solutions to homeowners and to small and medium enterprises, including the agricultural sector. This book offers a framework, with lessons drawn from recent experience, guiding principles for public intervention and potential roles for donors and International Financial Institutions (IFIs). These lessons are expected to be used in developing affordable, effective and sustainable country-specific catastrophe insurance programs.
  • Publication
    Impact of Behavioral Issues on Green Growth Policies and Weather-Related Disaster Reduction in Developing Countries
    (World Bank, Washington, DC, 2012-10) Kunreuther, Howard; Michel-Kerjan, Erwann
    This paper focuses on how developing countries can change the way they prepare for disasters so they are better equipped to sustain economic growth. It discusses the importance of considering the goals of key decision makers and the need to understand the perceptions, systematics biases, and heuristics used by the relevant interested parties (the affected public, private and public sector organizations, and nongovernmental organizations) in choosing between alternatives. The paper highlights the importance of undertaking benefit-cost analysis to evaluate disaster risk reduction measures, recognizing that decision makers might not make meaningful use of this policy tool given their behavioral biases and simplified heuristics. To address these issues, the authors propose green growth strategies that involve multi-year contracts coupled with short-term incentives that have a chance of being implemented. The strategies focus on the role of multi-year micro-insurance, long-term loans, and multi-year catastrophe bonds that reflect the institutional arrangements in the developing country. The paper illustrates this proposal in the case of farmers' agricultural practices and investment decisions that reduce losses to property from catastrophic disasters such as drought.
  • Publication
    Initial Market Assessment
    (Washington, DC, 2013-09-22) World Bank
    Catastrophe exposure in Tanzania is limited and the key perils are drought and flood. These events have minimal impact on GDP but severe impacts on individuals in the agriculture sector, increasing their vulnerability. Thus, while there are merits to developing the agriculture insurance market in Tanzania, less of a case can be made to develop the catastrophe insurance market. Engagement in Tanzania to develop private sector catastrophe risk and agriculture insurance should be seen as a medium to long term engagement. Banking penetration is low, as is insurance and micro-insurance penetration, even when compared to regional countries. In addition, the insurance industry has struggled in recent years with profitability, indicating that insurance technical capacity within the country may be limited. There are low levels of local reinsurance capacity, with the majority of risks being reinsured off-shore. Thus development of catastrophe and agriculture insurance in Tanzania shall involve a multi-year engagement. Initially it is of paramount importance that insurance companies can manage insurance risk correctly (before beginning to think about adding covariate risks to their balance sheets). Expansion of disaster risk insurance into Tanzania could be seen as a second phase of an engagement looking to develop these markets in Eastern Africa, with Kenya targeted in the first phase. Given the comparative advantages of engaging in Kenya (see Kenya note), a potential course of action would be to use Kenya as a demonstration case in east Africa to spark interest in the Government for development of catastrophe and agriculture insurance markets. Using Kenya as a model example, lessons learnt can be applied in Tanzania to look to stimulate the catastrophe and agriculture insurance market. This strategy will also leverage private sector insurance companies that have headquarters in Kenya and field offices in Tanzania (Jubilee for example).

Users also downloaded

Showing related downloaded files

  • Publication
    The Journey Ahead
    (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-10-31) Bossavie, Laurent; Garrote Sánchez, Daniel; Makovec, Mattia
    The Journey Ahead: Supporting Successful Migration in Europe and Central Asia provides an in-depth analysis of international migration in Europe and Central Asia (ECA) and the implications for policy making. By identifying challenges and opportunities associated with migration in the region, it aims to inform a more nuanced, evidencebased debate on the costs and benefits of cross-border mobility. Using data-driven insights and new analysis, the report shows that migration has been an engine of prosperity and has helped address some of ECA’s demographic and socioeconomic disparities. Yet, migration’s full economic potential remains untapped. The report identifies multiple barriers keeping migration from achieving its full potential. Crucially, it argues that policies in both origin and destination countries can help maximize the development impacts of migration and effectively manage the economic, social, and political costs. Drawing from a wide range of literature, country experiences, and novel analysis, The Journey Ahead presents actionable policy options to enhance the benefits of migration for destination and origin countries and migrants themselves. Some measures can be taken unilaterally by countries, whereas others require close bilateral or regional coordination. The recommendations are tailored to different types of migration— forced displacement as well as high-skilled and low-skilled economic migration—and from the perspectives of both sending and receiving countries. This report serves as a comprehensive resource for governments, development partners, and other stakeholders throughout Europe and Central Asia, where the richness and diversity of migration experiences provide valuable insights for policy makers in other regions of the world.
  • Publication
    Economic Recovery
    (World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-04-06) Malpass, David; Georgieva, Kristalina; Yellen, Janet
    World Bank Group President David Malpass spoke about the world facing major challenges, including COVID, climate change, rising poverty and inequality and growing fragility and violence in many countries. He highlighted vaccines, working closely with Gavi, WHO, and UNICEF, the World Bank has conducted over one hundred capacity assessments, many even more before vaccines were available. The World Bank Group worked to achieve a debt service suspension initiative and increased transparency in debt contracts at developing countries. The World Bank Group is finalizing a new climate change action plan, which includes a big step up in financing, building on their record climate financing over the past two years. He noted big challenges to bring all together to achieve GRID: green, resilient, and inclusive development. Janet Yellen, U.S. Secretary of the Treasury, mentioned focusing on vulnerable people during the pandemic. Kristalina Georgieva, Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund, focused on giving everyone a fair shot during a sustainable recovery. All three commented on the importance of tackling climate change.
  • Publication
    Media and Messages for Nutrition and Health
    (World Bank, Washington, DC, 2020-06) Calleja, Ramon V., Jr.; Mbuya, Nkosinathi V.N.; Morimoto, Tomo; Thitsy, Sophavanh
    The Lao People’s Democratic Republic (Lao PDR) has experienced rapid and significant economic growth over the past decade. However, poor nutritional outcomes remain a concern. Rates of childhood undernutrition are particularly high in remote, rural, and upland areas. Media have the potential to play an important role in shaping health and nutrition–related behaviors and practices as well as in promoting sociocultural and economic development that might contribute to improved nutritional outcomes. This report presents the results of a media audit (MA) that was conducted to inform the development and production of mass media advocacy and communication strategies and materials with a focus on maternal and child health and nutrition that would reach the most people from the poorest communities in northern Lao PDR. Making more people aware of useful information, essential services and products and influencing them to use these effectively is the ultimate goal of mass media campaigns, and the MA measures the potential effectiveness of media efforts to reach this goal. The effectiveness of communication channels to deliver health and nutrition messages to target beneficiaries to ensure maximum reach and uptake can be viewed in terms of preferences, satisfaction, and trust. Overall, the four most accessed media channels for receiving information among communities in the study areas were village announcements, mobile phones, television, and out-of-home (OOH) media. Of the accessed media channels, the top three most preferred channels were village announcements (40 percent), television (26 percent), and mobile phones (19 percent). In terms of trust, village announcements were the most trusted source of information (64 percent), followed by mobile phones (14 percent) and television (11 percent). Hence of all the media channels, village announcements are the most preferred, have the most satisfied users, and are the most trusted source of information in study communities from four provinces in Lao PDR with some of the highest burden of childhood undernutrition.
  • Publication
    Remarks at the United Nations Biodiversity Conference
    (World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-10-12) Malpass, David
    World Bank Group President David Malpass discussed biodiversity and climate change being closely interlinked, with terrestrial and marine ecosystems serving as critically important carbon sinks. At the same time climate change acts as a direct driver of biodiversity and ecosystem services loss. The World Bank has financed biodiversity conservation around the world, including over 116 million hectares of Marine and Coastal Protected Areas, 10 million hectares of Terrestrial Protected Areas, and over 300 protected habitats, biological buffer zones and reserves. The COVID pandemic, biodiversity loss, climate change are all reminders of how connected we are. The recovery from this pandemic is an opportunity to put in place more effective policies, institutions, and resources to address biodiversity loss.
  • Publication
    South Asia Development Update, April 2024: Jobs for Resilience
    (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-04-02) World Bank
    South Asia is expected to continue to be the fastest-growing emerging market and developing economy (EMDE) region over the next two years. This is largely thanks to robust growth in India, but growth is also expected to pick up in most other South Asian economies. However, growth in the near-term is more reliant on the public sector than elsewhere, whereas private investment, in particular, continues to be weak. Efforts to rein in elevated debt, borrowing costs, and fiscal deficits may eventually weigh on growth and limit governments' ability to respond to increasingly frequent climate shocks. Yet, the provision of public goods is among the most effective strategies for climate adaptation. This is especially the case for households and farms, which tend to rely on shifting their efforts to non-agricultural jobs. These strategies are less effective forms of climate adaptation, in part because opportunities to move out of agriculture are limited by the region’s below-average employment ratios in the non-agricultural sector and for women. Because employment growth is falling short of working-age population growth, the region fails to fully capitalize on its demographic dividend. Vibrant, competitive firms are key to unlocking the demographic dividend, robust private investment, and workers’ ability to move out of agriculture. A range of policies could spur firm growth, including improved business climates and institutions, the removal of financial sector restrictions, and greater openness to trade and capital flows.