DUBAI
The 12th edition of the World Takaful Conference (WTC) opened in Dubai on Tuesday with the participation of 350 Islamic insurance leaders from around the world.
Delivering a keynote address at the gathering Ebrahim Obaid Al Zaabi, Director General, Insurance Authority (IA) UAE, emphasised the need for more collaboration among regulators and standard setters to address the prevalent fragmentation of the takaful industry.
“Takaful sector has been reporting health growth in demand for types of Takaful products. However, despite the specific laws that have been issued in many countries, we are still in a bad need of preparing Islamic financial systems that cope with the economic changes and overcome the challenges,” said Al Zaabi.
The UAE is considered a leader in the global takaful industry and the world’s leader in the Islamic financial transaction codification initiatives. Compared with 2008, the total investments have increased by 579 per cent to reach Dh4.323 billion in 2016.
This year’s World Takaful Conference is held under the theme of ‘Stability, Authenticity & Technological Transformation’ and many speakers called for use of technology and innovation to reach out takaful products and services to greater number of people and markets around the world.
“There is an appetite to do more in Islamic Fintech. Takaful Insurance is growing and is underpenetrated and being taken up by the younger generation who embrace new technology. Innovation in products without innovation in business models, artificial intelligence (AI), big data and algorithms — is sub-optimal,” said Salmaan Jaffery, Chief Business Development Officer, Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC) Authority.
Calling on Islamic financial services industry to embrace Fintech revolution happening around the world, Jaffery said takaful industry and Islamic finance badly need a technology transformation.
“The technology disruptions associated with the so called fourth industrial revolution is being talked about much in the context of conventional financial services. Here is a huge opportunity for the Islamic financial services industry including takaful to embrace technology and digitisation to gain market share around the world,” Jaffery said.
A number of speakers at the conference emphasised the need for innovation and greater digitisation in the industry. Islamic Fintech is the next wave of change that is expected to transform the industry. “There is a need for the industry to reinvent itself in the context of technology disruptions,” Jaffery said.
The second day of the conference will take shape in the form of a dedicated platform called InsurTech Integrated that will focus on the impact of disruptive technologies on the insurance industry.
