Insured losses from 2013 natural disasters reached $45 billion

Insured losses from natural disaster events last year totalled $45 billion, the lowest since 2009, Impact Forecasting reports in its global catastrophe recap for 2013.

Economic losses from 296 events reached $192 billion, according to the firm, which is the catastrophe model development arm of Aon Benfield. That’s 4% lower than the 10-year average of $200 billion, but an above average number of events (surpassing 259).

“2013 was an active year for serious catastrophe events but one in which the industry dodged the bullet of a single dominating insured event,” Stephen Mildenhall, CEO of Aon Benfield Analytics commented in a statement.

“Typhoon Haiyan, however, demonstrated the real and ever-present potential for large scale destruction,” he added. “U.S. insured losses, at 45% of the total, were in-line with the U.S. 42% share of global property premium.”

Typhoon Haiyan, which hit the Philippines in November, was the deadliest natural catastrophe of the year, with 8,000 people dead or missing, according to the report.

Flooding events in May and June in central Europe were the costliest of the year, at an estimated $5.3 billion in insured losses and $22 billion in economic losses, according to the report.

Floods overall made up 35% of all economic losses globally during the year, their highest percentage of aggregate losses since 2010, the firm added. Outside of Europe, notable flood events occurred in Indonesia, the Philippines, China and Australia, along with the summer flooding in Calgary and Toronto.

While the United States accounted for 16% of economic losses last year, it accounted for 45% for all insured losses globally because of its higher insurance penetration, the report notes.

“Despite registering nine separate billion-dollar events, natural disaster losses in the U.S. were down 78 percent from 2012,” Steve Bowen, senior scientist and meteorologist at Impact Forecasting commented in a statement.

“The most significant losses in 2013 were found in Europe and Asia Pacific, where each region endured multiple events that had major financial and societal implications,” he added.

Apart from Haiyan, “typhoon activity in the Western Pacific also led to Typhoon Fitow becoming the second-costliest insured event in China’s history after payouts surpassed $1 billion,” Bowen said. “An active year in Europe saw economic losses that were the highest since 2002 and 90% above its recent 10-year average.”

Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA) and the Americas (Non-U.S.) each sustained aggregate insured losses above their 10-year averages in 2013, while the U.S. and Asia-Pacific (APAC) regions both incurred below normal insured losses, according to Impact Forecasting.

The U.S. was also free from hurricanes in 2013, marking eight consecutive years without a Category 3 or higher storm making landfall.

Globally, 15 tropical cyclones made landfall last year, just below the average of 16 during 1980 to 2012. Thirteen of the landfalls were registered in the Northern Hemisphere, including nine in Asia, the report says.

Severe drought also to billion-dollar losses in Brazil, China, New Zealand and the U.S. during the year.

In terms of climate, the report says that preliminary data suggests that 2013 was the fourth warmest year recorded since global land and ocean temperature records began in 1880.