Insurance education key to unlocking Africa

The role of global reinsurers must extend beyond their traditional duties when ceding risk for local insurers in African markets. In particular, they must invest in education around insurance in the region.

That is the view of Peter King, managing director at broker CKRe. He believes they must provide the expertise, the rating and the risk evaluation, as well as looking at efficient ways to build capacity.

“It is important that global players make a firm commitment each year to put aside some money, go to a handful of countries and lecture local insurance people on the types of insurance that the world takes for granted,” said King.

The same premise can be applied to risk management. If a local insurer cannot illustrate competent risk management it can become difficult to convince a foreign reinsurer to get on board to provide capacity.

“If they really want commitment to writing their chosen line of business, they have to get involved in general education on risk management, delivering surveys, etc,” King said. “It’s such a cheap investment but it would reap rewards straight away.”

King’s comments were made in a wider feature about the African reinsurance market. To read the full article, click here.