NAICOM outlines guidelines and measures to bridge financial inclusion in insurance sector

The National Insurance Commission (NAICOM), in addressing financial inclusion gap in the insurance industry, has introduced microinsurance guidelines and licensed eight microinsurers; released takaful guidelines and licensed four takaful companies; Commissioner for Insurance, Sunday Thomas, has said.

He disclosed this yesterday at the Fintech Conference 2023, organised by Supernews Nigeria in Lagos, adding that recently NAICOM also released the Bancassurance and the Web Aggregator Guidelines that has attracted many applicants and some licenses have already been issued.

Thomas, who was represented by Deputy Director, NAICOM, Ajibola Bankole, in his remark on the conference theme: “Imperative of Fintech in Promoting Financial Inclusion in Nigeria”, noted that financial inclusion according to Global Partnership for Inclusion (2011) ‘is a state in which all working age adult have effective access to credit; savings; payments and insurance from formal providers.

He said effective access involves; convenient & responsible service delivery, at a cost affordable to the consumer & sustainable for the provider (Demand & Supply Side) with the Result that the financial excluded becomes included.

Thomas maintained that it is worthy to state that financial Inclusion has assumed a critical development policy priority in Nigeria with the National Financial Inclusion Strategy (NFIS) which was aimed at reducing the exclusion gap to 20 per cent at the end of 2020.

The Commissioner for Insurance submitted that
the reality of present times is that data provided by EFInA from its two yearly survey on access to financial services in Nigeria revealed that although some progress has been made, as those financially excluded has reduced from 52.2 per cent (45.5million) in 2008 to 36 per cent (38million) in 2020.This simply means we may not reach the NFIS target until 2030.

Thomas noted that as a subset of the financial services industry, insurance industry as a responsibility to guarantee the sustainability of growth and development of the economy, considered technology as a key driver for market development.

“It is in furtherance of this that the Commission has invested heavily in automating its processes as well as facilitated the space for financial inclusion growth in the industry. This is in order to accelerate the Insur-Tech eco-system.

“We live in a dynamic age, where the application of technology does not only enhance businesses for profit maximization but also now serving as a disruptor to existing business models;
Technology as a Disruptor when considered in relation to; Cloud Computing, Mobile Computing, AI, Blockchain Tech, IoT, Data Analytics, Usage Based Insurance (PAYD, PHYD) using Telematics, is the new market platform; For instance, Telematic has been identified to be disrupting the Insurance Sector by basically altering how risks are evaluated and premiums defined,” he said.

He submitted that the digital transformation of the Commission has also witnessed stages of progressive reforms spanning from upgrade of its IT infrastructures (Data Centre, EDMS, ERP, Portal and Digital Chat-bot), to Automation (of Support, Technical, Industry Processing) and now to Partnership with FSD Africa on Bimalab Accelerator Program, R3 Lab (Risk Resilience and Regulatory Lab) and review of its Web Aggregator Guidelines that had been released and facilitated licencing of applicants.

The NAICOM boss said the future of Fintech started yesterday and InsurTech is now here, stressing that NAICOM hopes that the conference will re-energize the national inclusion policy that fully meets stakeholders needs which is to strengthen inclusion for the unbanked or under banked segments.

He said financial inclusion researches/data has shown that its nature, form and challenges differs amongst countries and cannot be addressed with a single product or one size fits all approach.

“We should therefore implement technology initiatives that takes into consideration the peculiarities of the Nigerian environment and most critically the local people.

Publisher/CEO, Supernews Nigeria, Ngozi Onyeakusi, said fintech and financial inclusion hold a great potential for the Nigerian economy and for the financial stability of the country.

She submitted that the emergence of COVID-19 in 2020 no doubt projected the need for adoption of Fintech in our daily activities and businesses, but not without its attendant challenges.

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