The events that are unfolding in Syria could prove to be the basis for a significant boost to the insurance sector in the country – but it will require something of a Damascene conversion from the old to the new to make this happen.
As readers of Middle East Insurance Review will read in our special focus on Syria in this issue, the insurance sector in the country has largely atrophied since the Arab Spring in 2011 – hand-in-hand with the decline of the broader Syrian economy.
But the 22m population may once again be able to buy protection in the form of life and health insurance if the country can avoid descending into a territory riven by internecine strife and misrule. The welcome return of the Syrian diaspora could also help boost domestic demand for protection products.
From a purely economic perspective, from the oil industry to the phosphates sector, from textiles to agriculture, there is plenty of room for growth of many general lines of insurance business.
Given the right conditions, Syria could be the insurance growth story of 2025-2026, as long as neighbouring countries allow the nation to find its own new equilibrium and do not force it to have to fend off hostile land grabs and self-serving provocations of unrest.
As General Arab Insurance Federation (GAIF) secretary general Chakib Abouzaid tells us later in this issue, “The local insurance industry will benefit in the medium and long term. However, there are two issues to be addressed: The ‘central’ role of the state in the economy should be limited to strategic industries; and insurance regulation must be revisited.”
It is here that the broader insurance sector must play a part. The Syrian insurance regulator may need a crash course in how to oversee a sector that has grown to adopt InsurTechs, AI, blockchain and digital insurers since it has been adrift in the Assad-induced wilderness.
The best teachers may prove to be other regulators in the region who have successfully grappled with these same issues themselves.
Bodies such as GAIF could also have a role to play – supporting, encouraging and teaching – so that the Syrian insurance sector is provided with the best possible guidance to grow and flourish.
Syrian insurance professionals who have been working in other countries may also form part of the returning diaspora, bring up-to-the-minute skills and expertise to bear on the fledgling sector within Syria.
And, of course, global and regional insurance groups may also wish to enter the country – or perhaps re-enter the country – bringing both their expertise and their balance sheets to take part in the rebirth of the nation.
It would not be an overstatement to say that the future of insurance at present is balanced on a knife edge in Syria. It is up to the insurance sector in the MENA region as much as it is to the domestic sector and everyday nationals to make sure that the balance, when it tips, is in the right direction. M
Paul McNamara
Editorial director
Middle East Insurance Review