Africa insures a startling sliver of its disaster losses — just 3 to 5 per cent, against roughly 40 per cent globally — leaving governments to shoulder more than 90 per cent of losses estimated at USD 7–15 billion. That was the sobering figure delivered to delegates as the inaugural CDRFI Africa Forum opened in Nairobi.
Held over two days under the theme “Increasing Insurability to Close the Protection Gap in Africa,” the Forum drew senior government officials, insurance regulators, development partners and industry representatives from 21 countries to work out how to better finance climate and disaster risk, with particular attention to protecting resilient strategic and critical infrastructure.
Delegates opened proceedings with a shared call to action: identify the assets most exposed to disaster risk, sharpen the data behind those risk assessments, and put financing mechanisms in place well before disaster strikes. Representatives from Jamaica and the Philippines joined as counterparts, sharing how their own countries have approached disaster risk financing and insurance.
The Forum is a new initiative from ZEP-RE, held for the first time this year in partnership with the East Africa Insurance Supervisors Association (EAISA) and hosted by the Government of Kenya through the National Treasury. It grows out of the EAISA and ZEP-RE Strategic Forum, an annual gathering now in its eighth year, and marks the first time Ministries of Finance have joined the conversation directly — a shift that follows the 2025 Zanzibar Declaration adopted by EAISA.
Under that Declaration, insurance regulators from 12 countries committed to backing programmes that protect critical public infrastructure. This Forum pushed for those commitments to move past declaration and into implementation, through an ongoing, government-led Community of Practice.
Representing the Guest of Honour, Hon. Felix K. Koskei, Chief of Staff and Head of the Public Service was Dr. Boniface Makokha, Principal Secretary for Economic Planning in Kenya’s National Treasury, who emphasised the importance of identifying assets exposed to disaster risks and determining in advance how their recovery would be financed. “The question is no longer whether disasters will occur, but whether our countries are financially prepared when they do,” he said.
ZEP-RE Managing Director and Group CEO Hope Murera called for a shift from emergency expenditure towards proactive financial preparedness.
“Disasters should not become fiscal crises,” Murera said. “Resilience is not a cost. It is an investment in growth and stability.”
Commissioner of Insurance and CEO of the Insurance Regulatory Authority of Kenya Mr. Godfrey Kiptum described closing the protection gap as a development priority. He called for regulation that protects policyholders while enabling innovation, citing the impending El Niño event as a reminder of the need to act before shocks occur.
EAISA Interim Chairperson Dr. Protazio Sande, Acting CEO of Uganda’s Insurance Regulatory Authority, linked insurability to investment. “If it is not insurable, perhaps it is not investable,” he said.
The Secretary General of the Insurance Development Forum Ekhosuehi Iyahen, said the challenge is one of insurability, not insurance alone.
“Prediction has improved faster than protection,” Ms. Iyahen said. “A protection gap is rarely just an insurance gap. It is almost always a development gap.”
She also pointed to Shock-Resilient Loans, an emerging concept exploring whether sovereign lending could be structured so that risk transfer mechanisms give governments automatic fiscal breathing room in the aftermath of a major shock.
Emiko Todoroki of the World Bank Group’s disaster risk finance practice pressed for financing strategies tailored to each country’s specific risk profile, arguing that governments need a blend of tools — budget reserves, contingent financing, insurance, and investment in risk reduction — matched to different tiers of risk and built well ahead of the next disaster.
From Emergency Response to Pre-Arranged Finance
The Forum’s first panel, “From Policy to Practice: Sovereign Risk Finance in Africa and Southeast Asia,” moderated by James Sinah of the World Bank Group, dug into the financial tools governments currently rely on and weighed which risks might be better handed off to the private sector rather than held on government balance sheets.
Panellists included Ronald Inyangala, Director of the Financial and Sectoral Department at Kenya’s National Treasury; Herbert Asiimwe, Head of Financial Sector Development at Rwanda’s Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning; Likezo Musabani, Acting Director of Zambia’s Disaster Management and Mitigation Unit; Sharon Almanza, National Treasurer of the Philippines; and Hope Murera of ZEP-RE.
In closing the session, Sinah identified three priorities: protecting public assets as a feasible and immediate development priority rather than a long-term ambition; recognising that no single financial instrument can address every risk, making risk layering essential; and strengthening government leadership alongside regulatory support. He also emphasised the importance of identifying and prioritising assets and, where possible, pooling risks regionally to create scale.
Closing the Gap Through Insurance, Data and Innovation
The second panel, moderated by Linet Odera, ZEP-RE Group Chief, Public Sector and Inclusive Solutions, brought together Ekhosuehi Iyahen of the Insurance Development Forum; Evie Calcutt and Ommid Saberi of the World Bank Group; and Denis Mugagga of Uganda’s Ministry of Finance, Planning and Economic Development. Panellists explored why the protection gap persists even as disaster losses climb, and what it would take to make African insurance markets more insurable in the first place. One idea that gained traction: thematic risk pools, which could give countries participating in the Zanzibar Declaration on the Financial Protection of Critical Public Infrastructure a way to tackle uninsurability and thin underwriting capacity — both symptoms of how systemic climate risk collides with Africa’s relatively small insurance markets.
In closing, Ms. Odera highlighted three priorities for narrowing the protection gap: reliable data, stronger analytics and modelling capabilities, and innovation to advance insurance markets. Better risk information, she noted, can strengthen resilience planning, support product development and contribute to market development.
ZEP-RE also used the opening session to unveil its third annual Sustainability Report, Building Resilience Across Africa, now available on the company’s website.