The Climate Insurance Fund, an initiative set up by German Development Bank KfW, aiming to improve access to and the use of weather and climate insurance in developing countries, has signed up BlueOrchard partnered with weather index insurance specialists CelsiusPro, to manage the fund.
The Climate Insurance Fund is designed to be a thematic fund aiming to reduce the vulnerability of micro, small and medium enterprises as well as low-income households to weather-related threats by investing in insurance related businesses. As an impact investing opportunity, it will enable access to a social investment opportunity, with the allocation of capital being used to help to expand the development of and access to weather and climate insurance products.
The fund has been looking for a manager and BlueOrchard, an experienced investment manager in the microfinance space, in a partnership with CelsiusPro has won the rigorous international tender process, to be appointed as Fund Manager. The partnership brings together BlueOrchard’s leading track record in microfinance and strong network in the field, with CelsiusPro’s in-depth expertise in climate, weather and catastrophe insurance products, from structuring to origination, and its proprietary pricing platform.
Patrick Scheurle, BlueOrchard’s Chief Operating Officer, stated; “The Climate Insurance Fund is a perfect fit for our portfolio of investment solutions and perpetuates BlueOrchard’s long tradition of empowering the most vulnerable in our global community.”
Mark Rueegg, Celsius Pro’s Founder and Chief Executive Officer, added; “The Climate Insurance Fund is a unique solution to an increasingly urgent global issue and we appreciate the opportunity to provide our expertise in climate insurance to such an initiative.”
The objective of the Climate Insurance Fund is to contribute to the adaptation to climate change by improving access to and the use of insurance in developing countries and emerging markets. The Climate Insurance Fund provides financing to qualified insurance companies and intermediaries based in developing countries that offer insurance solutions against extreme weather events and natural catastrophes and/or agricultural insurance.
As a result the Climate Insurance Fund will be strongly biased towards helping parametric and weather index linked insurance products to develop, advancing these growing markets. CelsiusPro’s expertise in creating, measuring, structuring and pricing weather index and weather derivative products will prove invaluable to the fund manager’s activities and likely be used to help financed initiatives to get off the ground.
Source - http://wrma.org/
