The Institute for Catastrophic Loss Reduction today called on individual home builders to join the insurance industry in building disaster resilient homes.
Speaking at the pre-conference meeting of the 62nd National Conference of the Canadian Home Builders’ Association in St. John’s, ICLR Executive Director, Paul Kovacs said, “I am here today to challenge leaders in the home construction industry to partner with Canada’s insurers to build better homes — disaster resilient homes, homes designed for safer living.”
He told the audience that, “disaster losses have doubled every five to 10 years since the 1950s, and last year exceeded $50 billion world wide. If this trend continues, insurers around the world will face a trillion dollars in damage claims over the next 15 years. This is an alarming trend. It is not sustainable and needs to be confronted.”
Kovacs explained that Canada’s insurers are looking to partner with the home construction industry and other stakeholders to roll out the “Designed…for safer living: program over the next 12 to 24 months.
There are three elements to the program:
- Investing in safety research that identifies better home design and construction practices for new homes;
- Educating homeowners about hazard safety improvements that should be made to existing homes; and
- Working with home builders to create and build hazard-resilient homes.
“Home builders in the United States have been pleased with the safer living program. This provides us with a solid foundation for success in Canada,” Kovacs said.
Established in 1998 by Canada’s property and casualty insurers, ICLR is an independent, not-for-profit research institute based in Toronto and The University of Western Ontario in London.