Inflation, Unemployment Trigger Huge Operating Cost For Insurers

Galloping inflation, rising unemployment, flooding, and other natural catastrophes, perennial power outages, internecine conflicts between herders and farmers, among others, triggered high costs of operations for insurance companies in the 2022 financial year.

The chairman, Nigerian Insurers Association (NIA), Mr. Olusegun Omosehin, who made this known at its 52nd annual general meeting (AGM), held at the Insurers House in Victoria Island(VI), Lagos, on Tuesday, added that, the menace of kidnappers and bandits, insurgency in the Northeast, especially, around the Lake Chad Basin, poor infrastructural facilities, flooding, and other natural catastrophes, increasing poverty levels, and the geometric rise in the exchange rate of the Naira to the US dollar as continued to be a major challenge to businesses, resulting in high costs of operations for businesses and players in the insurance sector of the nation’s economy.

Despite the economic downturn being experienced in Nigeria with its cataclysmic effect on all aspects of national life, he said, the Nigerian insurance industry continues to take pride in its place in the Nigerian economic space as the economic driver, restorer of businesses, and dependable safeguard for national assets.

Omosehin stated it is worth noting that, as a subset of the national financial system, the insurance industry also had a fair dose of the general economic and socio-political problems bedevilling the country in the past year.

The chairman said, notwithstanding these challenges, insurance companies, during the 2022 financial year, were able to grow premium income to about N726.2 billion, an increase of about 33.9 per cent over the premium income of N569.1 billion recorded in 2021.

While he received the appreciation of shareholders for the successful efforts of the board and management to position the association for increased growth, he noted that NIA takes initiative to increase insurance penetration in the country.

He promised that the association will continue to work closely with the National Insurance Commission (NAICOM) and other stakeholders within the financial services and technology segments to promote the business of insurance and increase its contribution to national GDP, believing that the initiatives will lead to increased insurance penetration in the country.