On Thursday 20 June, the World Bank hosted the first-ever event that facilitated a global exchange for the member countries that form the four major regional risk pools: Africa, the Pacific, Caribbean and Central America, and South East Asia.
Sovereign risk pools, along with other disaster risk finance and insurance solutions, can complement risk reduction by helping governments address residual risk that cannot be mitigated through risk reduction alone. Through risk pools, countries can pool risks in a diversified portfolio, retain some risks and transfer excess risk to reinsurers and capital markets.
The half-day session was led and facilitated by the World Bank’s Sumati Rajput, Senior Financial Sector Specialist and Shoko Takemoto, Disaster Risk Management Specialist. The session invited several member countries to present their profiles including Harold Lewis from St Vincent and Grenadines, Ephod Kachigwada from Malawi and Somxay Keovandy from Lao PDR.