Climate Resilience Dialogue

Despite the global effort to limit temperature increase to 1.5°C, the devastating effects of climate change are evident. The financial cost of climate change is already high and on the rise, yet only around 30% of climate change-related losses are currently covered by insurance.

The main objective of the Dialogue is to narrow this Climate Protection Gap – the gulf between how much is lost and how much is insured - and to find ways to stimulate investment in good adaptation.

The primary task of the Climate Resilience Dialogue is to exchange views on how to address the losses incurred from climate-related disasters and to identify how the insurance industry can contribute more to climate adaptation, from actions that increase the penetration of climate risk insurance for industry and all of society, to making the conditions right for more investment in good adaptation solutions.

The Climate Resilience Dialogue is a special group co-chaired by DG CLIMA and DG FISMA, and is one of the actions the Commission has undertaken to reduce the climate protection gap, as announced in the EU Strategy on Adaptation to Climate Change and the Strategy for Financing the Transition to a Sustainable Economy. The objective of the Climate Resilience Dialogue is to create a forum for discussion that will strengthen the collective understanding of insurers, reinsurers, businesses, consumers and other stakeholders about the climate protection gap. Both strategies are part of the European Green Deal, and aim to increase and accelerate the EU’s efforts to protect nature, people and livelihoods against the unavoidable impacts of climate change.

The European Commission has set up the Dialogue, will host its meetings. The Commission will facilitate the discussion to ensure a constructive exchange, striving to maintain a positive spirit of collaboration between all participants. The Climate Resilience Dialogue was set up to develop voluntary commitments on actions that would contribute to reducing the climate protection gap.

Special groups are sui generis bodies that, based on their nature and the tasks which they perform, do not qualify as “Commission expert groups” or “other similar entities” in the understanding of the framework of Commission Decision C(2016)3301.

17 organisations are participating in the Dialogue to represent the full range of different stakeholders and actors (insurers, reinsurers, risk managers, public authorities and regions, and representatives of consumers and the real economy).

The Group is organised in two sub-groups:

1. Insurance Underwriting and Solutions 
2. Adaptation Investment

• Q4 2022: Pre-Launch and Launch events
• Throughout 2023: Meetings of the sub-groups and (two) plenary meetings
• Summer 2023: Publication of mid-term report
• Throughout 2024: Finalisation of common practices and voluntary commitments. Closing event
• Q2 2024: Publication of Final Report

On 27 July 2023, the Group released an Interim Report. The mid-term report outlines the work carried out by the Dialogue since its inception in November 2022. It starts with the definition of climate protection gap that the Group agreed to use for the purpose of its work. In this context, the Group reflected on the measurement and modelling of the climate protection gap. The report also indicates the focus areas and gaps for the Dialogue’s future work, the emphasis of which will be on the identification of solutions to specific climate protection gaps in the EU. Finally, the report presents preliminary observations of the Group on some of those focus areas and gaps.

In July 2024, the Climate Resilience Dialogue concluded its work and published a Final Report.

The Climate Resilience Dialogue, a temporary group of stakeholders set up by the European Commission, has been discussing solutions to narrow the climate protection gap and increase the resilience of economies and societies against climate change impacts.

The Final Report brings together insights and learnings from these discussions, putting forward actions and good practices to achieve the objectives of the Dialogue. More specifically, the document:

• provides a brief overview of the main climate-related risks to which people, businesses, and assets are currently exposed in Europe;
• analyses the key contributing factors of the climate protection gap (risk awareness, risk assessment, as well as other supply and demand factors such affordability of the premiums, mistrust vis-à-vis insurance, and limits to the insurability of risks);
• includes an analysis of possible solutions focusing on risk reduction, risk sharing and risk transfer approaches, such as public-private partnerships and other insurance-based solutions. This includes evolving insurance-based approaches with the potential to overcome some of the barriers of the climate protection gap;
• deep-dives into the main climate-related risk in Europe covering floods, wildfires, heatwaves, droughts and storms, highlighting lessons, good practices, and potential solutions stemming from past events that could be implemented to increase climate resilience.

Finally, the Report presents an overview of existing insights, lessons and learnings with the aim of proposing actions and integrated or collaborative approaches to the climate protection gap that help meet the needs of different types of stakeholders.

• 29/11/2022 - Launch event
  • Agenda
  • Minutes

EC-CLIMATE-RESILIENCE-DIALOGUEec [dot] europa [dot] eu (EC-CLIMATE-RESILIENCE-DIALOGUE[at]ec[dot]europa[dot]eu)

• Climate Resilience Dialogue Interim Report
• Staff working document - Closing the climate protection gap
• EU Adaptation Strategy
• Strategy for Financing the Transition to a Sustainable Economy
• Platform for members of the Climate Resilience Dialogue on the S-CIRCABC platform