[Event Recap] Affordable Disaster Risk Insurance through Public-Private Partnerships in the ECA and MENA regions

The first Impact Program under the World Bank Group (WBG) Academy has just concluded in Istanbul. Over 50 participants from 14 countries joined to learn about Affordable Disaster Risk Insurance through Public-Private Partnerships. As a result of the program, four countries are already accelerating their reforms on disaster insurance and one country is enthusiastic about holding the next program. Throughout the event, countries have developed connections with their peers and the private sector.

This 5-day executive education program, held in April 2025, was one of the first WBG Academy Impact Programs. The WBG Academy is a transformative initiative to deliver cutting-edge capacity development alongside its core services of analytics and financing. The Impact Programs are strategically designed to address critical development challenges and country-specific priorities, offering relevant knowledge, best practices, and tested solutions. They target ‘coalitions for change’: government officials, the private sector, central banks, regulatory bodies, civil society and think tanks. Based on peer-to-peer learning and supported by communities of experts, solutions are co-created to each country’s unique context and challenge. 

The event brought together representatives from central finance agencies, financial institutions, and insurance sector from 14 countries from the Europe and Central Asia (ECA) and Middle East and North Africa (MENA) regions including: Albania, Algeria, Djibouti, Egypt, Georgia, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyz Republic, Morocco, Republic of Moldova, Tajikistan, Tunisia, Uzbekistan, and the host country, Türkiye.

Partnerships were key for this program: organized by the World Bank Group including IFC, it was hosted jointly with the Turkish Catastrophe Insurance Pool (TCIP), the Insurance Development Forum, Boğaziçi University, and Istanbul Technical University.

This program’s objective was to help countries accelerate the development of disaster insurance markets through public-private insurance partnerships (PPIPs). The program aimed for participants to understand how effective PPIPs are developed, learning from larger-scale programs in peer countries with proven impact. It was created to help participants to learn the essential elements for PPIPs and disaster-risk finance which can contribute to increased resilience and more stable growth. Finally, it created an environment to work with academia, think-tanks, private sector, and other stakeholders to identify the building blocks of high-quality disaster insurance markets and risk-finance mechanisms fitted to the needs and challenges in their country.

The topics discussed included: (i) Key principles and anchoring sustainable Disaster Risk Finance (DRF) into policy and budgets, (ii) Enhancing Financial Resilience for Vulnerable Households and Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs), (iii) Getting Agriculture Insurance Right, (iv) Getting Property Catastrophe Insurance Right, and (v) International reinsurance market exchange with the Insurance Development Forum (IDF). 

Participants also learned about how to turn technical knowledge into practice: they took part in a stakeholder-mapping training to understand how to identify, influence, and manage stakeholders to ensure support and smooth implementation of reforms and investment. Participants put their ideas into practice in a “Shark Tank” exercise where they teamed up to develop a risk financing program to then pitch the idea to a panel of judges. The final session on country specific action planning brought together the learning from the week, with an opportunity to think practically about design, implementation, stakeholder mapping, and influencing.

The participants were extremely engaged throughout the program and took active participation in group exercises, discussions, the “Shark Tank” and action planning. The team received highly positive feedback from event participants, with 93 percent reporting that they gained a deeper understanding of PPIPs. The technical presentations were exceptionally well-rated, and the event design—featuring innovative elements like the shark tank exercise and peer-to-peer knowledge sharing—was recognized as a key differentiator from conventional training programs. Participants stated that they look forward to more events like this. 

The good news is that this is not a one-off event: in fact, the team is already planning the next steps to work with the countries as they turn knowledge into action. 

The resources, including presentations and handouts are available for download - Click here.