Blog

In a world of greater unpredictability and climate impacts, insurance can be a challenging product to deploy. Forward-thinking regulators, policymakers, and supervisors are changing their tactics, ensuring insurance can be a tool for inclusion. In a recent event bringing together alumni from Women’s World Banking’s Leadership and Diversity Program for Regulators (LDR), forward-thinking government institutions shared how they are approaching inclusive insurance. The session was sponsored and co-hosted by the Centre of Excellence on Gender-Smart Solutions, an initiative under the Global Shield against Climate Risks, and Access to Insurance Initiative (A2ii).

To be able to provide well-designed insurance solutions that address the needs of the low-income and excluded customers in a manner that is customer friendly but also economically sustainable, calls for innovation - i.e. to do new things or to do things differently.

What is it that makes digital, inclusive insurance possible – what kind of demand, supply or regulatory environment? What can the regulator reasonably do to provide such an environment, and how should a regulator go about planning and implementing this? And underlying all of that - what kind of support can capacity building providers such as A2ii provide to help insurance regulators along this journey?

In 2019, two supervisors from Belize were among those chosen by the A2ii to receive a scholarship to attend the program: Alma D. Gomez (senior official) and Alicia Leslie (a high-potential woman leader). The following is an interview with Ms Gomez, who is the Supervisor of Insurance and Pensions at the Office of the Supervisor of Insurance & Private Pensions (OSIPP) of Belize.