The Haiti earthquake and floods in Pakistan and China helped make 2010 an exceptional year for natural disasters, killing 295.000 and costing 130 billion US dollar, the world’s top reinsurer said Monday.
German reinsurer (genforsikringsselskab) Munich Re AG said, that major global catastrophes put 2010 among the six most loss-intensive years for the insurance industry since 1980.
“The high number of weather-related natural catastrophes and record temperatures both globally and in different regions of the world provide further indications of advancing climate change”, said Munich Re in a report.
Of the total losses, around 37 billion dollar were insured, according to Munich Re. A total of 950 natural catastrophes were recorded in 2010, which was slightly above the high average of the past 10 years, Munich Re said.
The last time so many people died in natural disasters was in 1983, when 300.000 people perished, mainly due to famine in Ethiopia, spokesman Gerd Henghuber said.
The total of 950 natural disasters make 2010 the second worst year since 1980. The average number of events over the past 10 years was 785.
Munich Re said that 2010 was one of the severest hurricane seasons in the past 100 years, but that, fortunately, “most of the storms remained over the open sea”. Altogether, there were 19 named tropical cyclones and 12 of these storms attained hurricane strength.
Kilde: www.worldbank.org
