Iolanda Didonna

Jorge Luzzi and Julia Graham: the first person I met and the last I heard in the meeting – so started and finished my FERMA Forum 2013. Four intensive days all lived in one breath between workshops, networking, Ladies in Risk Management lunch, young risk professionals’ breakfast, Fermapero and Fermanight.

But I am not here to tell you how every single event went and what happened. Many of you were there and the rest of you, who were not, will have already read many articles about it.

You may wonder, then, what more can I say than what has already been said. Well, in my small way I can tell you my impression as a young, professional woman of 25 years old, who as a board member of UGARI, the Italian union of young insurers and reinsurers, had the chance to attend the most important European event of the industry…the FERMA Forum!

I certainly can’t make comparisons with previous FERMA events, because as you may have guessed, it was my first Forum, but I can guarantee that the air that we breathed was an air of great change, as evidenced by the figure of the woman – from the Ladies’ Lunch to the appointment of the new President, Julia Graham. The change cannot possibly be ignored.

Furthermore, young risk professionals received ample time with the our breakfast to pursue the objectives fixed by FERMA, to educate, inspire and influence to a greater awareness of risk. They became, for me the true nourishment of these four days. As Nelson Mandela wrote: “Education is the most powerful weapon to change the world!”

I think that this statement could sum up the values and goals that we have mentioned before and, in my opinion, the foundation of change that our industry is experiencing. Thus, this is what FERMA is so well placed to communicate.
So let’s help to make good luck for Julia Graham for her term of office. I’ll see you in Venice in 2015!

By Iolanda Didonna

(Pictures of the Forum 2013 in Maastricht)