The Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI) has entered into its first bilateral agreement with the Insurance Authority of United Arab Emirates (UAE).

The Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was signed by Chairman TS Vijayan, with his counterpart in the UAE regulator, last week.

The pact assumes significance in the wake of the increase in the upper limit of foreign direct investment to 49 per cent from 26 per cent, and rising interest of global insurance players in India.

“In fact, there has been interest from many other countries, including the US, in forging collaboration with IRDAI,” Executive Director Sriram Taranikanti told BusinessLine on Thursday. These are expected to materialise soon.

The MoU provides for sharing of information and documents, exchange of experience, insurance supervisory aspects, trends and policies, international issues, and sharing of information on cross-border establishments, among others.

The advantage of such global understandings for collaboration will help the regulator seek vital information on matters of insurance or insurers from collaborating countries, which could help in policy and regulatory decisions. Indications of global economic recovery lately also call for greater collaboration between regulators.

According to the ‘World Insurance in 2014’ report by reinsurance major Swiss Re, the economic environment for insurers improved marginally in 2014 as global real gross domestic product rose 2.7 per cent.

Global life insurance premiums written stood at $2,655 billion, up 4.3 per cent compared to the previous year.

India’s share in the global life insurance business market was 2.8 per cent, while in non-life it was at 0.69 per cent.

Related Topics
comment COMMENT NOW