African insurers meet in Morocco

The African Insurance Organization (AIO) opened Tuesday in Fez its 26th conference, with 600 delegates attending.

During the conference, themed "The role of African insurance and re-insurance in mobilizing savings to finance economic activity," African insurers will examine means to make their role as institutional investors more efficient.

In an opening address, Moroccan Finance and Economy Minister Fathallah Oualalou called for endowing African countries with performing and competitive insurance systems to enable them to mobilize savings that will help finance economic activity.

The minister called for the working out of an efficient and diligent judicial system that will contribute to the promotion of all sorts of insurance.

He said Morocco embarked over the few past years on an ambitious program to reform the insurance market through the liquidation of non-performing insurance firms, the renovation of the juridical frame and the development of bank insurance.

The African insurance market accounts only for 1 % of the World market, and the annual per capita insurance premium do not exceed $ 75 in the continent.

The African Insurance Organization is a non-governmental organization, set up in 1972 with the prime objective of promoting insurance and re-insurance in Africa.

The organization, based in Cameroon, currently musters 230 members in 42 African countries. Ten Moroccan insurance firms are expected to join the Organization during the Fez meeting which will bring the Moroccan seats to 14.