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MANAMA: The success of Sharia-compliant insurance policies has been a significant step for the Gulf insurance sectors.
That was the message from Central Bank of Bahrain (CBB) Governor Rasheed Al Maraj at the opening of the Corporate Governance through Risk Profiling conference yesterday.
The conference is being held at the Diplomat Radisson SAS Hotel Residence and is organised by Gulf Union Insurance Group in co-ordination with the Coordination Commission for Gulf Insurance and Reinsurance Companies.
"The insurance sector has seen great developments in the past few years, represented by the notable increase in the number of companies whether in direct insurance or re-insurance, or supporting activities such as brokers, consultants and loss adjustors," he said.
"There is no doubt that convening this conference and the topics of discussions constitute a great importance not only to this industry, but also to the CBB due to the fact that developing the insurance industry in Bahrain is one of the strategic directives of the CBB in developing the financial services industry in the country."
He said the CBB was keen to introduce wide-ranging modifications to the insurance sector regulations, including takaful that is compliant with Sharia principles since the transfer of the supervisory responsibilities to the CBB in 2002.
"With the development of insurance products compliant with Sharia principles, the scopes of insurance companies' regional employment has expanded and thus attracted an increasing number of international companies which took Bahrain as a centre for their operations, due to the appropriate regulatory and legislative environment, he said.
Other speakers at the opening ceremony included Gulf Union Insurance and Projects Management Holdings Company chairman Abdul Aziz Al Al Turki, General Arab Insurance Federation secretary general Abdel-Khalif R Khalil and Gulf Union Insurance Group managing director Percy Albert Sequeira, who further emphasised the importance of the conference. "The technological advancement and rapid development of information technology and communications systems has had a direct impact on the environment companies operate in, especially large companies with international presence," Mr Al Turki said. |
