This is a follow-up from the Inception Workshop held in March 2021 as the first in a series of activities to develop a Diagnostic Report for Inclusive Insurance and Risk Finance and integrating insurance into development in Ghana.
The diagnostic report seeks to identify the current state as well as highlight challenges and opportunities in the inclusive insurance and risk finance environment in Ghana. The report will identify areas that UNDP, together with partners, can leverage through technical assistance projects over the next 2 to 3 years to create a more effective enabling environment for inclusive insurance and risk finance. Emphasis is placed on developing and deploying specific solutions relevant to the Ghanaian context.
Background
The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) is a global organization with 17,000 staff working in approximately 170 offices toward supporting governments in developing strong policies, institutions and partnerships to achieve the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals. UNDP’s policy work carried out at HQ, Regional and Country Office levels forms a contiguous spectrum of deep local knowledge to cutting-edge global perspectives and advocacy.
In order to streamline its financial and investment engagement, UNDP launched the Finance Sector Hub – a finance and innovation platform that draws on a critical mass of UNDP expertise, initiatives, and partnerships to support the mobilization and leveraging of resources for the SDGs and lead implementation of the new UNDP private sector strategy and other initiatives.
UNDP’s Work on Insurance and Risk Financing
The collaboration between the insurance industry and development sector has grown significantly over the last five years. Key initiatives, such as the Insurance Development Forum, InsuResilience Global Partnership and the Ocean Risk and Resilience Action Alliance, have evolved into significant policy and standard setting partnerships; bringing together countries, the development sector and the private and mutual/cooperative sectors of industry. Increasingly, these partnerships are moving beyond policy to programming – with a strong focus on not only delivering insurance and risk financing solutions to countries and communities, but also on long-term transformational change of insurance markets.
UNDP’s growing work in this space has led to the creation of a flagship initiative on insurance and risk finance, and the creation of a dedicated facility for supporting UNDP Country Offices and country partners worldwide within the newly created Finance Sector Hub. This work covers a range of critical areas where insurance and risk transfer solutions and collaboration with the industry can add significantly to achieving and delivering on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
Covering inclusive insurance, sovereign risk financing, insurance investments, natural capital, health, SME development and more, UNDP will work toward developing and delivering insurance solutions together with countries and communities, as well as collaborating with partners to transform insurance markets through enhancing legislation, regulation and institutional capacity
Diagnostics for Insurance and Risk Finance
To implement the work of the Facility – in part through the start of the work of the Tripartite Agreement between UNDP, the Insurance Development Forum and the German government – UNDP Ghana Country Office conducted a full diagnostic review of all issues relevant to the Inclusive Insurance and Risk Finance environment in Ghana.
This diagnostic review examined supply and demand issues, the legislative and regulatory environment, community needs for insurance, and sovereign risk issues and opportunities, investments options for the insurance sector and how natural capital assets are or are not protected through financial tools including insurance. The outcome of this diagnostic work will lead to the development of an intervention programme to improve the enabling environment for inclusive insurance and risk financing in Ghana.
