The Prime Minister of Malta, Joseph Muscat, made a short presentation at the opening of the Seminar, describing the success of Malta as an insurance domicile and the government’s plans for future development. On the opening of the Seminar’s second day, Malta’s Minister for Finance Professor Edward Scicluna argued that while risk needs to be carefully managed, fear of risk can stifle investment, especially in relation to emerging markets
Said FERMA President Jo Willaert: “We were delighted that the Prime Minister, Minister of Finance and Professor Jo Bannister, Chairman of the Malta Financial Services Authority, came to the Seminar. It was particularly timely for a European organisation because Malta takes over the Presidency of the Council of Europe in January.”
In addition to the publication of the 2016 FERMA European Risk and Insurance Survey, the programme included additional sessions under the conference themes: leadership, knowledge and education. Risk manager-only roundtable workshops discussed five topical issues:
- Business continuity and resilience
- Digital risks
- ERM and leadership
- Financial transparency initiatives and the risk manager
- Risk management in small and medium sized companies
Three member associations presented their own sessions: the specificity of Malta from host association MARM; risk leadership on the board agenda from Airmic, led by former FERMA President and now Airmic Technical Director Julia Graham, and a cyber risk scenario organised by BELRIM.
The FERMA Seminar 2018 will take place in Brussels.
Roundtable snapshots
- “A good plan B five years ago doesn’t apply today. Even at board level, there is an under-estimate about world change.”
- “Many of our suppliers are SMEs. We need to identify the critical ones in the type of business and know that they are resilient. That includes not transferring risk obligations to them that they may not be able to fulfil.”
- “How many organisations have done a data classification exercise to identify critical information?”
- “The risk manager needs to be involved in transformation projects from the beginning.”
- “It’s now or never to seize the opportunity!”
- “Corporate insurance buyers are concerned about the impact of events, while providers of products are concerned about cause.”
