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Mar 2024

Editor's Message

Source: Asia Insurance Review | May 2016

So the merry month of May has crept up on us, but with such a burst of heat and drought around the region. Crops are cringing instead of the darling buds of May sprouting in all colours. As Shakespeare said “Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dimm’d”. This is something we cannot forget in this year’s 400th death anniversary celebrations of the Bard’s departure.
 
   Hence, we bring you a good read on how insurers can keep up with the increasing risk factors in agriculture in the face of climate change. 
 
   It is May, and the search for good news gets that much harder with the heat being on cyber attacks and the increasing political turmoil in the world. Cyber risks seem to be expanding on an exponential basis, and one wonders if there is enough capital in insurance to go all the way to provide cyber risk covers. We bring you an Asia Cyber Risk Summit in Singapore this month where we see the official launch of Cy-Rim – a government-supported private-public partnership between industry, academia and government with the aim of developing local capabilities and the cyber risk insurance market in Singapore with a global perspective. 
 
   It is seriously time to tackle the problem of cyber risks both internally and as an industry offering protection to clients both on the individual and corporate levels. We have lined up a special spread to get started, so do send your colleagues to the Summit to check out the state of play. Read on including the play for cyber privilege. 
 
   Our Cover Story this month takes a turn to bring you the banks’ determined drives to draw insurers into their fold and to stay committed as partners, while dispelling the myths and mysteries of bancassurance which guarantees greater business growth for insurers in tapping the creamy rich list of banks dripping with milk and honey. So where’s the catch? 
 
   On that sweet trail, our Country Profile is on Australia, easily one of the most sophisticated markets in Asia, where the secret is out: to win, one must simply be “customer-centric” from A to Z. Listen to the customers and let the customers tell your story. Australia beckons!
 
   May is also the month of the South Asian insurance regulators’ conference to explore the means of regional cooperation to enhance the insurance outreach. These are markets that need to expand insurance penetration, and they are leaving no stone unturned, including looking at how insurance regulators can help develop the market in partnership with the industry. From the perspective of having run the Asia Insurance Industry Awards for 20 years, I see the IRDAI requirement of at least 6% of premiums of each company coming from the rural sector as one of the greatest success stories and even feats in boosting innovation and market penetration in insurance. 
 
   With May, we bring you a whole myriad of interviews from key leaders as well as hot market news and stories, including RIMS 2016 at the Sea World, the ASEAN Forum, digitalisation and data analytics, diversity, a global real-time reinsurer platform, CFOs, motor in a driverless world, personalising insurance, forcing changes in healthcare. 
 
   But a must-read is the poser: “Good corporate governance and ethical culture: Is it a choice or dilemma?” Even the Bard will blush at the need for this question. 
 
   As it is May, we merrily face the uncertainties knowing that time and the hour run through the roughest day. Long live the Bard! 
 
   All the best and keep the entries coming for our 20th Asia Awards.
 
Sivam Subramaniam
Editor-in-Chief 
Asia Insurance Review

 

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