The Societal Resilience Programme identifies opportunities for the insurance industry to enhance societal resilience to climate risk on both the underwriting and asset management sides of its business.

As the physical frequency and impact of climate-related catastrophes continues to grow, so to are the economic losses. This has resulted in a protection gap emerging, a widening divide between the total economic and insured losses attributed to climate change. Today, the climate risk 'protection gap' stands at over US$ 100bn per annum (Swiss Re, 2016, www.sigma-explorer.com). This presents the insurance industry with numerous challenges including a loss of market share and a challenge to the traditional role commercial insurance plays as society’s financial risk transfer mechanism.

ClimateWise's Societal Resilience Programme directly addresses the protection gap. It identifies new risks and opportunities across the industry's risk carrying, risk management and asset management activities. Three distinct, yet interconnected research themes focus on asset management, regulation, and resilient cities.