A one-week international insurance seminar, organized and hosted by Ghana Reinsurance Company PLC ends this weekend. The seminar, which began on Monday, February 25, is taking place at the Rock City Hotel in Nkwatia Kwahu in the Eastern Region. It will end on March 2. This is the 18th edition of an annual event organized by Ghana Re, the largest reinsurance company headquartered in Ghana, but which is active all around the world.
The topic for this year’s International Insurance Seminar is: Property Insurance Underwriting and Claims Management – The Present and Evolving Trends.
The event has attracted some 60 participants drawn from across 24 different countries around the continent, Ghana inclusive, and from the Middle East. Participation is strictly by invitation. The host country has providing 37 participants, while the other 23 participants have come to Ghana from Jordan in the Middle east and from all over Africa. The non-Ghanaian African participants are from Cameroun, Zimbabwe, Zambia, South Africa, Kenya, Liberia, Nigeria, Mauritius, Ethiopia, Cote d’Ivoire and Sierra Leone.
Speaking at the opening ceremony for the event on Monday, Mr Joseph Adom, Deputy Managing Director of Ghana Reinsurance PLC explained to participants that the seminar is part of the company’s commitment to assist in the development of the technical capacity of its partners for the overall development of the insurance industry.
“As your Reinsurer of Choice, we at Ghana Re are of the firm belief that the development of technical capacity of our partners is an important tool for the growth of our industry” he asserted. “Ghana Re believes through training, we would help raise the skill sets within the insurance industry across Africa. It is for this reason that for the past 17 years, we have not wavered in our pursuit of this prime objective.”
Explaining the choice of property insurance as the topic for this year’s edition of the seminar, he noted that: “every day in our insurance practice, we are faced with claims of fire and other miscellaneous risks. Since property owners seek products that better protect their risk exposures, it is therefore important that property insurance underwriters continue to develop themselves, gain greater understanding and become more knowledgeable in addressing the changing nature of property risks. This would go a long way to help meet the underwriting and claims management expectation of our property insurance clients.”
While acknowledging that participants are already knowledgeable about property insurance practices, he however noted that the risk landscape is changing with all the happenings going on in the global economy and in the local economies of the respective countries from which the participants have been drawn. “In the light of this, a periodic seminar such as this helps to strengthen underwriters’ technical expertise and competencies.”
The resource person for the seminar is Dr Kwaku Appietu- Ankrah, the General Manager, Technical Operations at Ghana Re PLC’s head office in Accra., who is internationally renowned for his expertise and experience in the area of property insurance.
On the first two days of the seminar, he addressed property insurance underwriting including principal extensions, policy conditions and clauses. The topic for the third day was the claims management process. On the fourth day the issues addressed were: emerging trends in property insurance, new technologies and products; as well as innovative approaches to emerging trends. On day five – Friday – the topic is: climate change and property insurance underwriting.
Participants at the seminar have been appreciating Ghana Re for adding pivotally to their understanding of modern property insurance, particularly the emerging trends and their implications for professional practice with regards to this genre of insurance.
