Abstract

Every time a natural disaster happens, in Italy we discover that the country is exposed to catastrophic risks (earthquake, subsidence, land slides, storms, floods, etc.), and that they can generate enormous damage. In the recent case of Aquila city and the area around, earthquake caused losses for about 2-3 billions of euros but only 300 millions covered by insurance groups due to the low penetration of earthquake insurance policies. The drama derived from the single event calls for the attention of the whole society for the negative consequences and the economic and environmental damages size. But a more general knowledge of the risk exposure should stimulate the implementation of an insurance system, not only to provide financial resources covering the losses, but also to boost preventive measures for risks reduction. This paper presents an analysis of the reasons of the insurance system lack of implementation and of features of a national public/private system covering natural disasters consequences.