Webinar on Digitalisation in Inclusive Insurance: The Role of Supervisors in Meeting the Digital Challenge
Event Report:
The ASEAN Insurance Training and Research Institute (AITRI) and A2ii jointly conducted the “Digitalisation in Inclusive Insurance: The Role of Supervisors in Meeting the Digital Challenge” webinar to support the continuous development of ASEAN insurance markets, particularly on the opportunities and benefits that digitalisation can offer. The webinar was formally opened by the interim CEO of AITRI Jaya Kahli and had 53 participants from various insurance regulators mainly from the ASEAN region.
Session 1 dwelt on the topic “How Digitalisation is Re-shaping the Insurance Landscape” where Pascale Lamb (A2ii) explained the current innovation trends affecting the insurance industry including its main drivers, their impact on supervisors, and the role of A2ii in supporting the innovation efforts of supervisors.
Session 2 was on “Regulating Innovation” and featured a presentation on the recently published report of the IAIS which addressed developments and issues particularly on Application programming interface (API) and Open Data, Decentralised Finance, artificial intelligence and machine learning including their current uses by supervisors, business models, and the opportunities and risks that comes with them. The session was presented by Hanne van Voorden, Head of Supervisory Practices and Operations of the IAIS.
Session 3, “Innovative Supervision”, focused on the joint A2ii-IAIS-FSI paper on Suptech in Insurance Supervision in 2022. The first portion of the session was a presentation on paper itself by Jeremy Prenio, Principal Advisor of the BIS, focusing on the current tools used by supervisors in prudential and conduct supervision, the “wish list” of supervisors regarding such tools, and the challenges and requirements for further advancing the use of SupTech tools in the future. The second part dwelt on specific challenges of SupTech facing EMDEs which was presented by Manoj Pandey of the UNEP-V20 Sustainable Insurance Facility. The final portion presented the experience of the South Africa Reserve Bank’s journey in meeting the digital challenge which was presented by Daniel Masiya, Business Transformation Manager.
Event Announcement:
In Asia, the use of mobile insurance as well as other technologies is rapidly increasing thereby improving access to and uptake of insurance for households and Micro Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs).
Innovation and technology have and continue to contribute to enhancing financial inclusion, including providing more convenient and accessible financial services to consumers. Consumers are not the only ones benefiting from greater digitalisation, as insurance supervisors increasingly use innovative technologies to support their work. However, with the fast pace of digital advancements, insurance supervisors increasingly need to enhance their capacities to cope with the intricacies of digitalisation. Improper regulation may lead to financial exclusion, erosion of trust and even harm the industry’s reputation. To fully realise the opportunities and benefits that digital innovation can offer, supportive regulatory frameworks are needed that will contribute to the development of insurance markets while at the same time protecting consumers.
Against this background, Access to Insurance Initiative (A2ii) and the ASEAN Insurance Training and Research (AITRI) will be hosting a webinar in support of the continuous development of ASEAN insurance markets on 1 March 2023, 15:00 to 17:00 Kuala Lumpur time (08:00 CET). Registration will close on 27 February 2023.
Attendance is complementary for AITRI members and USD 50 for non-members.
