Mutual/cooperative insurance law needs to be acknowledged
Forty-five per cent of the countries do not have mutual/cooperative insurance law, according to research from the International Cooperative and Mutual Insurance Federation (ICMIF).
This number represented nine per cent of the world's gross domestic product (GDP) and accounted for around 16 per cent of the aggregate population of people living in these countries.
According to ICMIF's study, people in low income countries had the least access to mutual/cooperative insurance with 63 per cent of these states having no mutual/cooperative law in place at all.
ICMIF chief executive, Shaun Tarbuck, said that policymakers, regulators and commentators needed to fully understand the cooperative and mutual insurance business model, and that ICMIF had called upon global, regional and national institutions to play their part in ensuring an appropriate business environment for cooperative and mutual insurance.
"More than 950 million people worldwide are served by mutual or cooperative insurers. It is the fastest growing part of the insurance sector but we still have to address these areas where our model does not yet have adequate legislation to allow it to function," he said.
However, he noted that there were a few positive signs that proved the regulators were beginning to acknowledge the issue. This included the Chinese Insurance Regulatory Commission (CIRC), which was advised by ICMIF, and member organisation the MGEN Group from France, and granted licences last month to the first three mutual insurers in the country.
According to ICMIF, the mutual sector currently holds 27 per cent of the global insurance market share by premium and as a sector accounts for more than 1.1 million jobs.
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