Mumbai:
The measure of insurance penetration and density reflects the level of development of insurance sector in a country. While insurance penetration is measured as the percentage of insurance premium to GDP, insurance density is calculated as the ratio of premium to population (per capita premium).
During the first decade of insurance sector liberalisation in India , the sector has reported consistent increase in insurance penetration from 2.71 percent in 2001 to 5.20 percent in 2009. Since then the level of penetration was declining and dropped to a level of 3.30 in 2014.
However, it started increasing since 2015 and showing an increasing trend onwards viz. in 2015 (3.44 percent), in 2016 (3.49 percent) and in 2017 (3.69), said IRDAI latest annual report fpr 2017=18, released on Wedenesday..
The level of insurance density reached the maximum of USD 64.4 in the year 2010 from the level of USD 11.5 in 2001.
However, from the year 2011 to 2016 it was hovering between 50 to 60 but in the year 2017, it has grown up to USD 73 (USD 59.7 in 2016). I.2.10 The insurance density of life insurance sector had gone up from USD 9.1 in 2001 to reach the peak at USD 55.7 in 2010.
Since then it has exhibited a declining trend up to the year 2013. During the year 2017, the level of life insurance density was USD 55.00 (USD 46.50 in 2016).
Life
The life insurance penetration had gone up from 2.15 percent in 2001 to 4.60 percent in 2009. Since then, it has exhibited a declining trend up to the year 2014.
There was a slight increase in 2015 reaching 2.72 percent, remained same in 2016 and increased to 2.76 in the year 2017.
Non-Life
The penetration of non-life insurance sector in the country has gone up from 0.56 in 2001 to 0.93 in 2017(0.77 in 2016). Its density has gone up from USD 2.4 in 2001 to USD 18.0 in 2017(13.20 in 2016)
At the end of March 2018, there are 68 insurers operating in India; of which 24 are life insurers, 27 are general insurers, 6 are Standalone health insurers exclusively doing health insurance business and 11 are re-insurers including foreign reinsurers branches and Lloyd’s India. Of the 68 insurers presently in operation, eight are in the public sector and the remaining sixty are in the private sector. Two specialized insurers, namely ECGC and AIC, one life insurer namely LIC of India (LIC), four in general insurance and one in reinsurance namely GIC Re. are in public sector.
23 life insurers, 21 general insurers, 6 standalone health insurers and 10 reinsurers including foreign reinsurers’ branches and Lloyd’s India are inprivate sector.
Indian Insurance in the global scenario
Indian Insurance in the global scenario. Globally, India’s share in global insurance market was 2.0 percent during 2017. However, during 2017, the total insurance premium in India increased by 10.1 percent (inflation adjusted) whereas global total insurance premium increased by 1.5 percent (inflation adjusted).
Globally, the share of life insurance business in total premium was 54.32 percent.
However, the share of life insurance business for India was very high at 74.73 percent while the share of non-life insurance business was at 25.27 percent.
In life insurance business, India is ranked 10th among the 88 countries, for which data is published by Swiss Re. India’s share in global life insurance market was 2.76 percent during 2017. However, during 2017, the life insurance premium in India increased by 8.0 percent (inflation adjusted) when global life insurance premium increased by 0.5 percent. I.2.7 The Indian non-life insurance sector witnessed a growth of 16.7 percent (inflation adjusted) during 2017.
During the same period, the growth in global non-life premium was 2.8 percent. However, the share of Indian non-life insurance premium in global non-life insurance premium was at 1.11 percent and India ranked 15th in global non-life insurance markets.