Jamaica’s Minister of Finance, Dr. Nigel Clarke, has revealed that the country’s Tropical Cyclone policy with the Caribbean Catastrophe Risk Insurance Facility (CCRIF) has been triggered by Beryl, with a payment amount of $16.3 million.
Clarke recently received the Preliminary Modelled Loss and Policy Payment Report from the CCRIF in respect of Tropical Cyclone Beryl, noting, “The GOJ’s Tropical Cyclone policy with the CCRIF has been triggered with a payment amount of approximately US$16.3 million or approx. J$2.5 billion.
“Our policies with the CCRIF represent the 4th layer in the GOJ’s multilayered disaster risk financing framework.”
In the image below, one can see that the CCRIF parametric insurance sits in layer four, just beneath the residual risk that Jamaica’s $150 million IBRD catastrophe bond provides protection for.
Readers of our sister publication, Artemis, will know that the IBRD catastrophe bond was not triggered by the passage of Hurricane Beryl, with its centre passing 45 miles south of Kingston.
Of course, the country has a range of disaster risk contingency financing arrangements, a number of which were due to disburse capital. At this time, it’s not known whether Jamaica’s excess rainfall parametric insurance from the CCRIF has also been triggered.
In related news, CoreLogic has estimated that the total insurable losses from Hurricane Beryl across Jamaica and the Cayman Islands will be between $400 million and $700 million, while estimated insurable losses in Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula will be less than $1 billion.
According to CoreLogic, the losses include wind-only damage to residential, commercial, industrial, and agricultural properties, including damage to contents and business interruption.
It is worth noting that insurable losses account for damage to all modelled exposure types before the application of any insurance terms, and do not include losses to any regional insurance programs.
