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In late 2020, the InsuResilience Integrated Approaches Working Group launched four sectoral communities (SC) to increase the deep-dive into topic-specific discussions. One of them focuses on linking Nature- based Solutions (NbS) and risk transfer instruments. Overall, this sectoral community seeks to share knowledge on NbS and Risk Financing, help explore and test new risk financing solutions and identify ways to further mainstream NbS and Risk Financing into global climate change adaptation and Disaster Risk Reduction agendas. The SC conducted a survey of how insurers employ NbS. The survey also indicated a lack of agreed assessment tools for the NbS benefits, with a majority of insurers relying on pilot studies rather than widely accepted methodologies. The SC agreed to host a workshop on March 2022 to explore this further and discuss how NbS can be better integrated in catastrophe models and insurance pricing to account for changing protection levels. The workshop was a key milestone for the SC and marked the transition from initial scoping (phase 1) to solution-oriented collaboration (phase 2).

The workshop started off the year 2022 for the InsuResilience Sectoral Communtiy on Integrated Approaches to Resilience in Agriculture. The community brings together practitioners, researchers, project developers, funding partners and other CDRFI stakeholders with a vision to effectively integrate risk transfer approaches (such as insurance) with other resilience-building measures in the agricultural space. The event asked questions such as “what are integrated approaches in the agriculture space” and “how can we achieve a better integration between risk transfer and climate adaptation and comprehensive risk management?”.  The event also offered the opportunity to learn more about the open 7th call for funding proposals of the InsuResilience Solutions Fund with a special window on climate-smart agriculture projects, and to inform the way ‘integrated approaches’ are designed, assessed and evaluated in the further project development process. The workshop featured speakers, among others, from GIZ, UC Davis/ Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Markets, Risk and Resilience, and the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI). In an interactive format, the workshop allowed interaction and networking among participants. The workshop was open to members of the Sectoral Community, InsuResilience, and other interested parties. For more information on the workshop, have a look at the report, and do not hesitate to reach out to secretariat@insuresilience.org.

This report compiles all major events, announcements and achievements related to the InsuResilience Global Partnership that took place during COP 27 in Egypt. The InsuResilience Secretariat co-organised seven events with a focus on Climate and Disaster Risk Finance, vulnerability to climate change and many more in Sharm-El-Sheikh. We welcomed two new members to the partnership: The Systematic Observations Financing Facility (SOFF) and the Islamic Corporation for the Insurance of Investment and Export Credit (ICIEC).

In partnership with the Vulnerable Twenty (V20), the Group of Seven (G7) committed to jointly work towards a Global Shield against Climate Risks. To this end, this concept is proposed together by the V20 and the German G7 Presidency and aims to set out a potential structure of the Global Shield (GS), including key elements and processes. In its current version, it includes the diverse perspectives of the G7, V20 and members of the InsuResilience High-Level Consultative Group (HLCG) and Program Alliance (PA). It will be tabled for endorsement at the upcoming InsuResilience HLCG meeting in October 2022 with the aim of launching the GS at COP27 in November 2022.

The InsuResilience Annual Forum is the global flagship event of the climate and disaster risk financing community, bringing together members of the InsuResilience Global Partnership and the wider resilience community to exchange knowledge on lessons learned, best practices and innovations. The fifth edition of the InsuResilience Annual Forum provided a platform for open discussions on key Climate and Disaster Risk Finance and Insurance (CDRFI) topics such as SMART premium and capital support, leveraging public-private partnerships, or avenues for collaboration in the field of inclusive insurance.

On 18-19 February 2019, EPFL organised a workshop of the SmartResilience project, hosted by the Swiss Re Institute in Zurich. The workshop gathered representatives from insurance and insurance experts. After providing some general considerations about insurance, resilience and critical infrastructure (CI) to describe the context in which the methodologies developed by the SmartResilience project can be used in an insurance setting, this report provides an analysis of the contribution of SmartResilience to insurance. The analysis elaborates from research made prior to the workshop, presentations made by partners of SmartResilience, and discussion among participants.

In 2019, three dialogue forums were jointly organised in Latin America, Africa, and Asia by the Access to Insurance Initiative (A2ii), the International Association of Insurance Supervisors (IAIS), Microinsurance Network (MiN) and InsuResilience Global Partnership, supported by local partners. The consultative forums treated the challenge that climate change is increasing the already-massive impact natural disasters have on the poor and vulnerable. Insurance as part of an integrated risk management package can play a vital role in building greater resilience and protecting individuals and communities; however, efforts are currently falling short, and a significant insurance protection gap remains. This event report provides a summary of the three consultative forums.

This event report summarises the objective, activities and next steps from the workshop held at Santam in Cape Town, South Africa on 20 February 2020 – hosted by Cenfri, FSD Africa and InsuResilience. The workshop was held in response to a need, identified by underwriters at the UNEP-PSI workshop in Lagos in 2019, to bring together a range of stakeholders to collaborate to mitigate risks and losses faced by communities, businesses and governments as result of climate-change driven disasters in Africa. Many of these disasters are driven by extreme weather events, including variability in rainfall patterns. The workshop brought together stakeholder groups and brainstorm opportunities for collaboration: Underwriters can strengthen the resilience of countries in the face of climate change by transferring risk to recover from disasters, by building resilient assets, by underpinning infrastructure through effective investment and underwriting approaches and by incentivising and capacitating risk management systems. Government/city officials are responsible for planning and maintaining cities and infrastructure, developing legislative and policy frameworks that incentivise adaptation, encouraging and coordinating action between various stakeholders at the regional/sub-regional level, catalysing funding for cross-sectoral initiatives and addressing market failures and barriers to adaptation efforts. Academics and experts provide scientific advice and analysis on climate change adaptation, increasing the understanding of effective responses to the complex socioeconomic and environmental impacts of climate change and helping other stakeholders to develop the strategies, tools and policy advice needed to respond effectively. Development partners can provide financial support, knowledge and other resources to facilitate adaptation efforts, and can initiate projects, programmes, or technical assistance efforts that support local or regional adaptation efforts.

This report summarizes key takeaways from the third InsuResilience Global Partnership Forum which took place on December 9, 2019, on the margins of COP25 in Madrid, Spain. The Forum focused on Climate and Disaster Risk Finance and Insurance (CDRFI) Solutions in the Caribbean, Latin and Central American regions with exchanges from all over the globe. Over 150 representatives from G20, V20 and other countries, international organizations, civil society, the private sector and academia came together to promote and enable the adoption of holistic climate risk management solutions. The InsuResilience Global Partnership (“the Partnership”) has the vision to strengthen the resilience of developing countries and protect the lives and livelihoods of poor and vulnerable people from the impacts of disasters. It aims to achieve this by closing the protection gap through climate and disaster risk finance and insurance solutions to facilitate timely and reliable post-disaster response. The annual Global Partnership Forum is the largest in-person gathering of Partnership Members from across the globe. The full-day event is a platform to exchange experience and knowledge and to raise awareness about risk finance and insurance by engaging all stakeholders of the Partnership. The first two Partnership Forums took place along the sidelines of COP23 in Bonn in 2017 and COP24 in Katowice in 2018.

The InsuResilience Global Partnership in collaboration with FARM-D, organised a webinar on June 3rd 2020 to further disseminate the findings of a recent study commissioned by the InsuResilience Secretariat, “Integrating Gender Considerations into Different Models of Climate Risk Insurance (CRI)” as part of the Live Talk Series on “Gender and Climate Risk Finance”. This event report summarizes key takeaways from the live talk.