Flooding in Iquitos, Peru

Peru: Protection for public infrastructure Introduction of a new insurance programme for public schools in Peru

The increase in extreme weather events such as floods has been presenting a major challenge to Peru. Public infrastructure is particularly important in this context. The InsuResilience Solutions Fund addresses this by supporting an insurance programme for public schools.

Peru is exposed to a vast range of natural hazards, including earthquakes, tsunamis and heavy rainfall, resulting in disastrous floods and landslides. However, reconstruction and repair are made difficult through demanding administrative requirements and a lack of capacity. This is particularly true for public infrastructure. For example, there are still 1,000 schools that had been damaged by the 2017 Coastal Niño and have not yet been rebuilt.

In order to enhance the resilience of public schools in Peru to natural disasters, the local insurance industry association, APESEG, has been working with the Insurance Development Forum (IDF) and other companies to develop an insurance programme. Within this project, which was launched by the Peruvian government, insurance serves as a catalyst for a comprehensive risk management programme. The idea is to define financing and reconstruction processes in advance, so that when a natural disaster occurs, the damage can be repaired more quickly and construction standards are improved over the long term. The use of innovative image recognition technologies can help to better document and quantify potential damage. This shortens the period needed to address the damage and, thus, the period during which the facilities in question are out of operation. This innovative procedure will also pave the way for similar protection for other public facilities such as hospitals, bridges and roads.

Support for the development of the new insurance product is being provided by the InsuResilience Solutions Fund (External link) (ISF), which finances 50 per cent of the product development costs and assists the partnership in its implementation efforts.