Barbados’ ongoing recovery efforts following the passage of Hurricane Elsa earlier this month have received a multi-million-dollar boost.
The Caribbean Catastrophe Risk Insurance Facility (CCRIF) on Thursday announced that it has made two payouts totalling US$2.5 million to the Barbados Government under the island’s tropical cyclone and excess rainfall parametric insurance facilities. It is CCRIF’s first payout for the 2021 Atlantic hurricane season.
The Mia Mottley administration is still assessing losses from the Category 1 storm which damaged over 2 000 homes and no price tag has yet been attached to the devastating impact of the system which included major roof loss and other damage to houses, downed poles and uprooted trees.
The CCRIF does not wait for on-the-ground assessments of loss and damage – unlike with indemnity insurance – to make payouts, therefore enabling the disbursement of funds within 14 days of an event.
“Parametric insurance that is offered by CCRIF is very different from traditional indemnity insurance. CCRIF’s parametric insurance products make payments based on the intensity of a natural hazard event (for example, hurricane wind speed, earthquake intensity, and volume of rainfall) and the exposure or assets affected by the event, and the amount of loss calculated in a pre-agreed model caused by the event,” the Facility explained in a statement.
“A country’s policy is triggered when the modelled loss for a hazard event in a member country equals or exceeds the attachment point selected by the country and specified in the policy contract (similar to a deductible in a traditional insurance contract).”
At a news conference last Friday, Prime Minister Mottley revealed that 2 177 houses were damaged when the weather system struck on July 2, with the majority of those properties located in St Michael (475), Christ Church (411), St Philip (288) and St George (284).
“Of the 2 177 cases, we’ve completed assessments on 1 391 and those assessment teams are constituted with engineers, project managers, quantity surveyors, people who are versed in this task,” she assured.
She said of that number, 352 houses would have to be rebuilt from scratch while 968 houses would be repaired and 18 persons had requested materials rather than having their houses rebuilt or repaired.
To date, Barbados has received seven payouts from the CCRIF totalling US$21.8 million.
CCRIF also made payments totalling US$528 512 to three other member governments – Haiti, Saint Lucia, and St. Vincent and the Grenadines – under the Aggregate Deductible Cover (ADC) feature of CCRIF’s tropical cyclone policies as a result of damage they received from Hurricane Elsa, the fifth tropical cyclone in this year’s hurricane season. (SD)
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