- October 9, 2022
- Posted by: admin
- Category: Financial Sector Management
The insurance sector plays an important role in an economy by providing protection against financial and economic risks. In recent years, the calls for increased regulation and supervision of the sector have increased owing, in part to the sector’s growing contribution to systemic risk. The global financial crisis of 2007/2008 demonstrated the growing importance of insurance companies and the need to strengthen regulatory and supervisory frameworks in the sector. As a result, some regulatory bodies have supported the implementation of macro-prudential policies to limit systemic risk arising from the insurance sector. This has been further necessitated by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic which calls for the need to enhance prudential and macroprudential supervision of the sector to maintain stability and improve the resilience of individual insurers and the sector as a whole.
Against this background, MEFMI conducted an e-learning course on Insurance Supervision and Economic Crises from 27 June to 5 August 2022. The objective of the course was to improve participants’ knowledge of the supervision and importance of the insurance sector in maintaining financial sector stability, particularly during crises and how regulators can mitigate systemic risks posed by insurance companies.
A total of 35 officials participated in the course, of which 40 percent were female. These were drawn from ten (10) MEFMI member countries namely Botswana, Eswatini, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
The course enhanced the participants’ understanding of the best practices in the regulation and supervision, risk management, macroprudential oversight and solvency regulation of insurance companies. The participants also went through the Insurance Core Principles, which are the global standards for insurance supervision developed by the International Association of Insurance Supervisors. MEFMI expects the trained official to use the knowledge acquired from the course to improve the supervision practices at their respective authorities.
Prepared by Noel Mahombera