drought

The current near-record El Niño event appears on the wane, with conditions attributed to the phenomenon said to be in decline, but its effects set to be felt for some time to come, with insurance and reinsurance firms now turning their heads to the possible development of La Niña conditions.

Three Argentinian enterprises have joined forces to develop climate index futures to help agricultural producers to better protect themselves against the impacts of severe or inclement weather, with drought the first targeted product launch.

As the 2015/16 El Niño event intensifies there is an expectation that global economic losses from drought will surpass the previous forecasts of $8 billion, suggesting a growing toll for crop insurance, reinsurance and any ILS investors exposed to agricultural lines.

Globally the risks posed by and impacts created by droughts and heatwaves have been growing in recent years, yet drought itself remains a widely underestimated natural hazard, according to a recent report published by the worlds largest reinsurer Munich Re. According to Munich Re’s report, there have been around ten loss-producing droughts around the world […]

According to Munich Re, the world’s largest reinsurer, global crop insurance claims in 2012 reached a massive $23 billion. Munich Re attributes as much as $15 billion of these losses in the U.S. due to the severe drought in 2012. Crop losses are growing with increasing insurance penetration and in years to come these figures […]

The development of microinsurance products using satellite data to create index-based insurance products is a growing industry and one which is showing increasing promise as the pilot projects scale out to encompass thousands of policyholders. The application of satellite technologies to create indices against which insurance products can be triggered is changing the way farmers […]

A report from rating agency Standard & Poor’s estimates that the U.S. crop insurance and reinsurance sector will see losses of over $5 billion from the severe drought which has been affecting much of the country in 2012. S&P says that however large the loss becomes they believe it will impact crop insurers earnings but […]

Just two or three weeks ago many insurance publications were suggesting that crop insurance losses resulting from the severe drought in the U.S. would not be large enough to hit the global reinsurance market. We’ve been cautious on this point, as we could see the increasing severity of the drought (the worst in more than […]

A new study from reinsurer Swiss Re shows that with drought conditions becoming more common in Europe a side effect has been an increase in the incidence of drought induced soil subsidence, resulting in higher levels of property damage. The study suggests that the changing climate will magnify the risk of soil subsidence and a […]

Here’s another great example of microinsurance in action through the use of index-based weather insurance policies for farmers in developing nations. Farmers in Kibwezi, Kenya have become the first to receive a payout from a recently launched drought insurance product sold by Jubilee Insurance.