Less than two out of ten families, 17%, are aware of the catastrophe risk relating to their homes, while 83% think they are safe from seismic or hydrogeological phenomena. Result: only 40% of Italian homes are insured (8,7 million contracts, with sums insured equal to 3,344 billion euros), and above all only 2% of the total national housing stock (5% of housing policies) has an adequate extension of coverage to catastrophic events, including earthquakes or hydrogeological instability. This is what emerges from the survey by ANIA, the national association of insurance companies, presented at a conference in Rome.
“All of this – explains Ania – takes place in a country, Italy, where in reality almost eight out of ten Italian homes (78%) are exposed to a high or medium-high risk between earthquake and hydrogeological phenomena”. In detail, 35% of Italian homes are exposed to high seismic risk while 55% are exposed to high hydrogeological risk. In twenty years, between 1996 and 2016, the economic damage caused by natural disasters amounted to 58 billion dollars. Italy, again according to data released by ANIA, is the sixth country in the world for damages suffered by natural catastrophes and every year the public sector intervenes for around 3 billion euros in damages.
The president of ANIA, Maria Bianca Farina, presenting the study of the association, suggests that Italy needs a “change of strategy that leads to preventive and structured risk management. The recent public interventions – Farina affirmed – are going in the right direction, but it is also necessary to adopt a regulated system of global and anticipated risk management”. “We are convinced – President Ania also said – that we are best suited to make a contribution. We are ready to sit down at a table together with the other actors to address and analyze the problem. It is a matter of sitting all together in the awareness that the country is being hit in order to structure a system. We are here, we offer our availability”.
The data on home policies, although absolutely low, is in any case growing enormously compared to a few years ago: just eight years ago, in 2009, the size of the catastrophe risk insurance market was much more contained, it did not exceed 20 contracts. Since then, almost 40 floods and three major seismic events have occurred in the country (in L'Aquila, Emilia and Central Italy) and "this has increased public opinion's perception of risks relating to natural catastrophes and, consequently, also the request for ad hoc insurance coverage".
