The Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) and the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) convened their first Joint Coordinating Committee (JCC) meeting today to advance their technical cooperation project aimed at strengthening the financial resilience of public assets against natural disasters.
The meeting marks a milestone in the three-year project titled “Strengthening Financial Resilience of Public Assets to Natural Disasters by Improvement of Public Insurance,” which was formally launched in May 2024 following a November 2023 agreement.
“This joint effort is not just about protecting the future of government assets. With a robust insurance framework, this collaborative mission is a proactive approach in demonstrating the GSIS commitment to build a stronger and safer nation through sustainable infrastructure practices,” GSIS President and General Manager Wick Veloso said.
“Climate change makes disasters more frequent and severe. Old insurance models and archaic underwriting systems no longer serve our needs,” Veloso added.
The Philippines ranks highest on the World Risk Index for the third consecutive year in 2024, underscoring the urgency of the initiative. The country has incurred approximately $23 billion (or about Php1 trillion) in losses from natural disasters since 1990.
The technical cooperation project is designed to enhance GSIS’s underwriting capabilities, improve the capacity of its Insurance Group to calculate replacement costs, and establish accurate insurance premium rates. This initiative will focus on developing an effective Information and Education Campaign (IEC) strategy to raise public awareness about the importance of insurance.
“There is a compelling need for us in the GSIS to harness advanced systems and innovative approaches. We are very happy and grateful to the Government of Japan and JICA for initiating this project. We believe that we can learn a lot from Japan’s best practices in public insurance and their ability to inculcate widespread consciousness towards insurance among the general public,” GSIS Core Business Sector Executive Vice President Jason Teng said.
The JCC meeting addresses key project components, including determining appropriate replacement costs for public assets, calculating risk-based premium rates, enhancing GSIS underwriting capacity, and promoting public insurance services. Representatives from the Department of Finance and Bureau of the Treasury joined officials from the GSIS and the JICA in overseeing the project progress.
The project aligns with the Department of Finance’s National Disaster Risk Financing and Insurance Strategy and the Bureau of the Treasury’s National Asset Registry System. It also supports the administration’s Build Better More infrastructure initiatives.
JICA Insurance Expert Team Lead Takeshi Kuwabara previously stated, “We believe that this partnership with the Philippine Government opens up new avenues of collaboration. This will enable us to integrate Japanese know-how and expertise with the GSIS to help build its capabilities and processes—creating better products and services to its customers.”
Japan is the third-largest insurance market globally, after the U.S. and China. In contrast, the Philippines has a largely underdeveloped insurance sector due to limited awareness and affordability. However, the GSIS is helping to boost the sector’s performance. In 2024, it reported a net income of Php136 billion, up 21.4% from 2023, with general insurance net income rising 43% to Php10 billion. The GSIS remains the largest state insurer with a net worth of Php62 billion.
